George MacDonald said:
"Work is not always required. There is such a thing as sacred idleness, the cultivation of which is now fearfully neglected." (Wilfrid Cumbermeade - 1872)
It seems that's a good word for our day. Often when we're not working, we're paying attention to something that takes thought and focus - even if it's scrolling social media or reading blogs or scanning news. Even pleasure reading requires something of us.
Our brains and our souls need times to unfocus. To pause. To let our minds wander. To look and to do nothing. Nothing measurable, at least.
Observing children can help us see this lived out.
Children are always doing something even when it seems like nothing. Dawdling over cereal. Smearing toothpaste. Dragging a blanket down the stairs. Squatting over an anthill. Clicking a light switch up and down. Catching a snowflake on a mitten. Patience tells us it's ok - let them be. They're kids. They do these things! We may not understand it - but we respect it.
What if we had patience with our own need to be idle? What if we took time.
Perhaps, if we took time to be idle, we would recharge for the busy. We would see the tiny. We would appreciate the unnoticed. We would experience the pause. We would wonder.
We would notice the bright eye of the sparrow.
We would see the tiny antennae of an ant.
We would smell the sharp of cinnamon.
We would hear the crunch of snow.
We would taste the goldness of honey.
We would feel the fibers of fabric.
We would appreciate the grain in wood.
We would marvel at the last puff of smoke of a burnt out candle as it drifts upward.
We would observe the fleetingness and preciousness of all the wonder.
As William Blake puts it:
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour
As the prophet Jeremiah said:
Thus says the LORD:
Stand by the roads, and look,
and ask for the ancient paths,
where the good way is, and walk in it,
and find rest for your souls.
~ Jeremiah 6:16a - ESV
And - I'm reminded of my favorite non-Bible quote:
"Look at everything always
as though you were seeing it
for the first or last time:
Thus is your time on earth
filled with glory.”
~ Betty Smith
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn - p. 406
So - a closing word from this blogger - stop reading this and go do something sacred: nothing!
