Clean Monday

Today is known as Clean Monday in the Eastern Orthodox tradition. The clean originally referred to the purification of the soul for Lent. Today it's customary to clean the house thoroughly, and, in Greece, people go on picnics, eat shellfish, and fly kites!

Agenda Today:

1. Spring Cleaning

2. Make laguna
3. Prayer of Cleansing

4. Write more intentions

1. Spring Cleaning:

Cleaning house is a custom for Clean Monday. In the Ukraine, Russia, and Greece everyone especially cleans the kitchen and the pots with which they have cooked festival foods, because today (in the Orthodox Church) is the start of the Lenten fast.

In March each year I take the first steps of spring cleaning - those big jobs that get put off through the winter months. But I've discovered that my energy no longer stretches to too many big jobs at a time! I'll try for one this week: to clean my kitchen cabinets - inside and out - and remove old food.

2. Make Lagana (Greek flat bread):

Today I often make Lagana, a simple Greek flat bread, traditionally made on Clean Monday. Its traditional to tear and not slice your loaf of lagana to avoid bad luck.

3. Prayer of Cleansing:

I Cleanse My Soul- Author Unknown 

I cleanse my soul in the dews of spring,

Light of mind's refreshing dew

Love of heart's renewing dew,

Life being's restoring dew,

Cleanse and recreate my soul this night.

May the souls of all beings be

Peacefully preserved

From fall of night
Till day's dear light.

4. Set more intentions for action:

I will write a few more intentions today. Remember, intentions are a proposal for the present that remind me of who I am now, and my deepest, most essential, most passionate reasons for living. I write my intentions in present tense, and I use this model: action + deepest reason.

I intend to clean each room thoroughly and let the spring air into my house, because this is one way I can make my home a sanctuary, a sacred space of refuge, for myself and my family.

 

I intend to paint landscapes with tenacity, and continue to explore my connection to the land through art, because my creativity is from and of God, and is the voice of my soul.