Today, I’m excited to announce the upcoming release of my book, Pilgrim Principles: Journeying with Intention in Everyday life, releasing January 6, 2014. Pilgrim Principles is a seven-week journey right at home that uses the Pilgrim Principles Rule of Life (download your copy for free when you subscribe here) to explore how to live like a pilgrim each day, infusing your daily life with spirituality and intention.
Each Wednesday until Christmas, I’ll be releasing a free preview of a section in each chapter. This week’s chapter is all about the first Pilgrim Principle, “A pilgrim looks for the Sacred in the quotidian” (which means “ordinary”), and focuses on how you can do that in your home. Other categories explored with this principle in the book include morning, work, community, and night. Come back Wednesday for a free preview from the next Pilgrim Principle: “A pilgrim practices somatic spirituality.”
Enjoy (and pass it on)!
pilgrim principles free book preview: home
You might not use the word ritual everyday. In fact, images of dancing around a fire in the light of the full moon might be going through your mind. Perhaps you’re more comfortable with the term tradition, but the truth is, ritual and tradition go hand in hand.
To understand more what a ritual really is, let’s look at the definitions of ritual and tradition so we can know the difference between the two. Tradition is defined as “something that is handed down…from generation to generation.” A ritual is defined as “a repetitive behavior,” often practiced for the purpose of observance. Tradition is about remembering, while ritual is about enacting.
What these two terms have in common is that they are both about making meaning. Tradition focuses on carrying on meaning from the past, while ritual is creating meaning in the present. The pilgrim knows this, and uses rituals to help her in her search for the Sacred within the quotidian. Through ritualization and the enacting of meaning, ordinary moments for the pilgrim can become moments of intention and Sacred Encounter. You can do this at home in your ordinary moments today.
Here are a few ways to ritualize the quotidian moments that are a part of life at home, inviting the Sacred into those ordinary places:
When you wake up and wash your face, bringing refreshment for the new day, splash your face three times: in the name of the Creator, Christ, and the Sacred Guide.
Many people start their day with a hot cup of coffee or tea. Instead of drinking it absentmindedly while watching the news, find a quiet place to sip your cup, being present with each delicious drop. It’s manna from heaven after all, isn’t it? It’s the least you could do.
Prepare dinner at night without any distractions, finding relief in the steady rhythm of the chop-chop-chopping of the knife on the cutting board. It might very well be the first silence you’ve experienced all day. You can either savor the silence, or you could use that time to pray or reflect over things you’re grateful for in the day you’ve just experienced. Try this with other tasks that take some time but must be done, like washing the dishes or mowing the lawn.
If you go around locking doors and closing windows before you go to bed each night, ritualize your physical actions toward safety as a prayer for your soul’s protection for the following day against whatever might lead you away from your truest self and the Sacred.
PRACTICE
Since rituals are about making meaning in the present moment, you can also easily create rituals of your own. Simply find something that seems ordinary or mundane in your day and figure out a way it could be more meaningful, infusing it with the Sacred.
REFLECTION
What is one regular aspect of your day that you can turn into a Sacred ritual?
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This post was an excerpt from
Pilgrim Principles: Journeying with Intention in Everyday Life,
releasing January 6, 2014.
Come back next Wednesday for another free preview!
3D book image by CodeArt