I vote in favor of quiet days with a sabbath intent.  Sabbath as in a day for being “joyful and restful.”  In her lovely little book Mudhouse Sabbath, Lauren Winner explains how in her Orthodox Jewish community there were those who interpreted the sabbath as a long list of do nots.  “Don’t write a sonnet or a sestina or a haiku; don’t even copy down a recipe...what it this boils down to (and boiling is another thing you can not do ...) is do not create.” 

As a young adult, Winner converts to Christianity and describes how keeping the Sabbath is both the piece of Judaism that would be easy to keep, and yet it becomes the piece she misses the most. “The Sabbath is a basic unit of Christian time, a day the Church, too, tries to devote to reverence of God and rest from toil.”  She shares her struggle with intellect and integrity.  Her words inspire me.  Alas, much of my professional life for the past 15+ years has included work to create a sabbath time for others, but not myself.   Neglecting my need for a day of rest and joy.  Not a good role model. 

Despite all sorts of fine intentions, I would all too often be up late on Saturday night preparing for an early Sunday morning of attempting to lift the spirits of others.  When I finally got home after “just one more thing” I’d collapse in my bed surrounded by the Sunday paper.  And incoherent mess of sleep and words.  Not the sort of spirited down time that would be particularly nourishing for my soul.  Just. Sheer. Exhaustion.

My inner introvert needs quiet time and unstructured blocks on the calendar to reconnect, recharge and renew.  Finding a new relationship with the Sabbath over the past seven months has allowed me to appreciate the gift of not creating from a place stress or chaos, but instead having space to simply be surrounded by creation.

So, enough words for today!  It’s time to not create!  Good Sabbath to you, no matter what day you celebrate it! 

With gratitude to those of you who have shared a bit of your heart this Lenten season...this iWeb program won’t allow some basic things like real blog comments so drop an email with a sample of your writing, your thoughts on daily practices or just say “hi” over on  the ol’facebook!