Week Three: Day 7 – Beauty and Enjoyment

We’ve come to the end of a week where we’ve been talking about how you relate to yourself – I want to say, how you love yourself. There’s some things that will make a real difference in your life: One is to have beauty as a daily part of the rhythm of your life, especially when you go through a difficult patch in life, or if every day is full of challenging things because of your relationships or because of your work or volunteer activities. Using your five senses to take in beauty will give you a different sense of balance in your life. The difficult things won’t go away, but you will get a much greater sense of harmony, blend, direction, focus, hope – by taking into your daily diet beauty.

Something also that I do is I plan for something that I know will be enjoyable, every day. Now, lots of things in the course of a day are enjoyable, but I actually plan for something that I know I’m going to do that will be enjoyable in the course of a day. Some days I’ve got this much time; some days I’ve got this much time. Planning for it and enjoying something will make such a difference.

Here’s something you may not include in your Rule of Life: you may not “dis” yourself. If there is a part of you that is continually critical about yourself, where you come up short, where you’re not “good enough,” where you should be other than what you are – that has to stop. You may not “dis” yourself. You may not disrespect yourself. You have to look kindly on yourself and love yourself as God your Creator does. You are God’s creation, a child of God’s adoration, and you need to cooperate with that. No “dissing.” No “dissing.”

Something that I practice every day is parting with something. Even in a monastery we accumulate things and I find it enormously liberating – I travel lighter – by parting with something every day. It will also change your relationship to things, where you’re aware that you’re stewarding something for as long as it’s helpful, and when it’s time to let it go, you part with it. Not cling, but part with it.

And then, lastly, what about Sabbath practice – a day for you to be and not to do? If you cannot figure into the rhythm of your life a weekly Sabbath, then think about a Sabbath practice that can inform some every day. It will make a world of difference to you, and you’re worth it!

– Br. Curtis Almquist

Question to Journal
How can you find and maintain a healthier balance in your life?