Everyday Holiness

Sacredness

“Something opens our wings. Something makes the boredom and hurt disappear. Someone fills the cup in front of us: We taste only sacredness.”

                                  Rumi

         Once, when I was living in Virginia in the 1990’s, I attended a poetry workshop at a farm outside Charlottesville. The teacher was a man from the Kennedy Center in Washington, whose name I cannot remember. What I do remember, vividly, is one exercise he gave us. We took an ordinary glass canning jar into the surrounding area to collect things that grabbed our attention. Some people went into the garden and gathered flowers, some went into the fenced pastures, and I went to the woods. As I walked around, I put things I was drawn to into the jar—a chunk of lime green moss, a bright blue-jay feather, a pretty rock, a variegated leaf. I was soon aware of just how sacred such ordinary things seem when you pay attention. When you look closely at them, they become living, breathing kindred spirits. I found the breast feather of an owl that looked almost like a spent dandelion flower that you pick and blow to watch the seeds float away. It was lighter than air and transparent. When I heard the bell ring to come back to the seminar, I didn’t want to leave that quiet cathedral of trees.

         When we allow ourselves to pay close attention to detail, to think about the lifetime of an object, we feel a kinship. We pay attention to things we love—for me, that is color. I see color first, the green of the moss, the blue of the feather. For you, it may be orderliness, or quality of the air, or the movement of water, or wind in the trees. Paying attention is a sign of love. And vice versa; if we pay close attention, we will grow in love an attachment, we will see aspects that were overlooked, and we will appreciate details we never before noticed.

         This is true whether I find the object in my home, or out in nature, though I’m more drawn to the out of doors. One object in my house that I especially love is a little blue bowl made for beating eggs. I like the feel of it, the ridges on its surface where the potters hands rounded it on his wheel, the light blue speckles in its glaze. It is 40 years old now, and I am especially careful not to break it.

I encourage you today to find something in your environment that you are drawn to, and give it five minutes of undivided attention. Explore it with all your senses. Allow it to speak to you. In this way, we imbue our world with sacredness.

                                  In the spirit,

                                  Jane

P.S. This works with people, too! If you love someone, pay attention to them. I mean, really pay attention to them.