Today, one of my dearest friends from grad school and fellow blogger, Heather Holleman, celebrates the 1st birthday of her blog Living with Flair. Like me, she posts daily, and in today’s post, she describes how she finds the inspiration for writing something at least approaching profound every day.
“What's it going to look like to embellish with wonder and deeply infuse the ordinary with some spiritual reality? Can I do this again today in the midst of the humdrum and the common routines?
I've taken on the spiritual discipline of finding God's truth reflected in the ordinary object: acorns, a cat's injured eye, a snowflake, a wandering albatross. I find that bit of truth that shows me, by analogy, a kingdom reality.
The ordinary day shimmers with God's radiance. The mundane does indeed become marvelous, and we simply have to worship.”
I've taken on the spiritual discipline of finding God's truth reflected in the ordinary object: acorns, a cat's injured eye, a snowflake, a wandering albatross. I find that bit of truth that shows me, by analogy, a kingdom reality.
The ordinary day shimmers with God's radiance. The mundane does indeed become marvelous, and we simply have to worship.”
She hits the nail on the head. There are often times, I am sitting at my computer, wanting nothing more than to shut down for the night and crawl into bed and let the mattress wick away the day’s cares. BUT, I have one more task to do--I have to think of a topic, write about it, and post it. What in the world will it be? So, I start praying and thinking over my day, which in itself is a remarkably worthwhile activity for anyone. Usually something will stick out like that one grain of sand on the beach that catches the sun just right, flashing like a miniature diamond.
I look at the event, memory, website, whatever, figure out a starting point and begin to write. It is amazing how often I have to go back and change the original title because where I ended up isn’t where I planned to go. But when you are creating while in an attitude of prayer and receptiveness, it is amazing what reveals itself out of the strangest things.
Do we approach our teaching and research in a similar manner? Do we look for solutions to problems through prayer and opening our eyes to the world around us or are we stuck in an endless “IF..THEN” or “WHILE…DO” loop. The beauty of interdisciplinarity is bringing new ideas from different fields together to solve new problems. Why not be interdisciplinary in our whole lives? That is the mark of literal integrity—our lives are unified, each part informing the others, seeking inspiration for problems, sharing success, diluting failure. I think this is part of why Christ used parables—He used familiar things and situations in new ways to bring new awareness on old problems. As Heather says, ‘finding God’s truth reflected in the ordinary object.’
Congratulations, Heather, on your first blogyear! May many more flow flairfully from your keyboard and God’s Spirit.
SDG
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