Sabbath for Synergy

Today is my sabbath, a day to step out of the fray, and regroup. My perfect sabbath is a celebration, a holiday. I keep it holy with my attitude: I don't rush, complain, or worry. Everything I do has a flavor of peace. I schedule some work, but it's work I find fulfilling, or uplifting. Simple is a great word to describe my ideal activities for the sabbath: Simple tasks, simple foods, and an undemanding schedule.

I'm celebrating synergy today - the ability to seek unity, embrace teamwork, live holistically, and work tirelessly towards a better end. Synergy is the eternally active primal force of creation: No matter what the conditions are, they will change.

Stephen Covey says, "Fulfilling the four needs [spiritual, mental, physical, social] in an integrated way is like combining elements in chemistry. When we reach a "critical mass" of integration, we experience spontaneous combustion -- an explosion of inner synergy that ignites the fire within and gives vision, passion, and a spirit of adventure to life." 

I'm going to create some synergy today, here at home, all by myself.

Agenda

1. Read Kurashi at Home

2. Create inner synergy for paper

3. Engage my mind

4. Engage my heart

5. Engage my body

6. Engage my spirit

7. Light a fire

First Quarter Moon in May

Tonight is the First Quarter Moon; we are one-quarter of the way through the moon cycle. The moon is waxing - growing in light and energy, creating a time for decisive action. I use this end-of-May quarter moon's energy to create synergy with all my partners, and spark synergy within myself.

Agenda Today:

1. Journal queries
2. Make a full effort plan
3. Write a leadership manifesto
4. Read the Creativity Book

New Peony Moon

Beautiful peonies growing in my neighborhood.

The new moon rises today; the Chinese call the fourth new moon the Peony Moon. Peonies are the flower of riches, romance, and honor, called sho yu in Chinese, which means "most beautiful." Their lush blooms are an omen of good fortune, and also foretell a happy marriage.

The new moon is the start of the lunar cycle, a time of high energy and clear thinking. Historically, the new moon is when women took time to be alone; it's a time to retreat, set intentions, and initiate something new.

Agenda:

1. Retreat Day

2. Journal queries

3. Choose a month theme

4. Goals and intentions

5. New moon altar and meditation

Joy of Tidying

I've recently re-organized my study so that my desk looks out onto the backyard instead of the neighbor's house. I swapped my desk and books with my sewing machine and all my sewing supplies; this shift took a few weeks and required a longer power strip.

I'm in the phase now of finding final homes for knick-knacks, odds and ends, and lots of papers. In fact, I've got a problem with notebooks, folders, and binders - like an addiction - they are everywhere! and it's making me itch. I want to find a new way to approach this situation that doesn't make so anxious.

1. Read "Kurashi at Home"

2. Read "Happier at Home"

3. Create a shrine to paper

Rogation Sunday and Mother's Day

Rogation-tide begins on the Sunday five weeks after Easter and continues for four more days, through Ascension Day on Thursday. 

Rogation is an early Christian tradition of singing psalms and chanting prayers of petition for God's protection on crops, beasts and people. Since medieval days, parishioners in Britain would walk around the parish boundaries, bearing a cross and banners, and asking for God to bless the crops, livestock, and fishing holes. The procession was called 'beating the bounds'; it helped everyone to remember the parish boundaries, in the time before maps were commonplace.

These boundary walks were also known as ‘gang days’ from the Anglo Saxon word ‘gangen’- to go. The parish would bond together as a community, offer charity to poor people they met along the way, and the priest would stop to preach at each prominent tree or landmark.

Now Rogation-tide is celebrated more as a time to honor the gift of creation of the land and waters, to offer thanksgiving for the labors on land and water that feed us, and to pray for stewardship of the earth.

Today is also Mother's Day, and a low-key time for me now that my daughter is a mother and I am a grandmother!

Agenda Today:

1. Journal query

2. Beat the bounds

3. Bless my garden

4. Make Rammalation Bisquits

5. Call my Mom 

Sabbath for Sanctuary

A sanctuary is a sanctum, a sacred and protected place of beauty, grace and refuge. Our home and garden is a sanctuary for body and soul; it embraces us and brings us back to center. When we take sanctuary, even for brief moments, we are re-created, recharged, healed, soothed, comforted and at peace.

One of my New Year's resolutions is: 

Sanctuary: I intend to care for my land with discipline and ritual, and create a home that is a peaceful and well-ordered sanctuary for those I love, because maintaining my land in good order is the honorable and sustainable thing to do, and is one way that I show reverence for the Earth and for God.

What I like about this resolution is that it encompasses my home, my land, my family and friends, the Earth and God. It helps me to de-compartmentalize my life and see it as a whole.

I hope to continue to define and upgrade our sanctum, an ongoing discipline of inner work (seeking inspiration, and upgrading my habits) and projects (creating a place of peace that expresses who we are).

Agenda:

1. Read Happier at Home

2. Spring tidying

3. Spring cleaning

4. Spring gardening