"My soul yearns for you in the night, my spirit within me earnestly seeks you" (Isaiah 26:9).
Nourishment of our spirit takes time and discipline. Sometimes we allow our spirit to hunger and thirst for days without offering ourselves good food for inner growth. Feeding our hunger for God means not only setting aside definite time but also using good resources such as scripture for our prayer time. The food that we place in our minds and hearts greatly affects the decisions and the choices of our days.
Giving of ourselves to others with quality presence. Quality presence means we have a heart of love and a desire to care for others. It means that "being with" is just as significant as "doing for." It means being willing to have nothing to show for our day's work except faithfully standing by the cross of another, or giving love in a celebrative moment, or attentive perceptive listening with our heart. This kind of presence creates peace, energy, and acceptance in the heart of another. Quality moments mean forgetting about clocks and calendars.
And how hard it is to achieve... Today marks the 8th day of my blogging project, and while I've kept up (for the most part) each day, I'm finding it difficult to find the time or energy each night to put the effort in to record my reflections. After long days at work, it's easy just to want to kick my feet up and watch Jay Leno.
I do believe, though, that this will be a rewarding experience, if for no other reason than to build the habit of reflection. I must admit, it seems a large part of my job involves "clocks and calendars", and as long as I'm there, I have to be cognizant of deadlines. I am fortunate, though, that I am blessed with more free time than many in the working world -- my company truly upholds its promise to respect my work/life balance. Usually, the term is thrown around as a buzzword to attract new employees, but I'm certain it's often neglected in reality.
It is up to me to decide how I will spend my time outside of work. It's probably good that wish I had more of it. Better, at least, than being bored. There are SO many things I want to do! Read, work out, relax, spend time with my closest friends, sleep, cook, volunteer, and lastly, sit and reflect. I don't have time for all of it, but I have to be okay with that, for now. The next several weeks, my focus will be sitting.
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