Not for the first time this week, I found myself at the end of a very long day feeling as if I had just crash-landed in time. It was one of my busy work days in which I’d skipped meditation time to get to the office early. From that beginning, I embarked on a series of meetings and appointments that left me without so much as a moment for a swallow of water. It was past 6:30 pm when I crashed, realizing everyone had gone home, that my head throbbed from 22 hours without food or water, and that I scarcely remembered what had occurred. This was no conscious one-pointed absorption in creative spiritual self-expression. This felt like a tedious slog through endless obligation and the expectations of others that left me drained.

I reached into my pocket for the stash of affirmations I carry with me from CSLT. The one I drew said “God makes my schedule.” At first I laughed. Then I realized that all day I had only been reacting to conditions around me, not consciously choosing to experience life as an expression of God. I am only able to remember God as my life when I am fully present in the moment to respond to events and choose my actions.

Believe it or not my next thought was about Benedictine monks. I was recently gifted a small book by Brother David Steindl-Rast, a scholar and monastic, entitled Music of Silence, A Sacred Journey through the Hours of the Day. In it, the author reminds us that time was not always equated with our modern linear 24-hour clock. Monks still seek to remember God through Hours of the day that are more like seasons of the year. In agricultural life, the seasons each bring their own call to action, whether for planting or reaping or rest. Likewise, the Canonical Hours like Vigils, Lauds. Prime and Vespers are calls to experience the seasons for waking, praying, working, resting and praise. Each Hour is an angelic Presence celebrated with bells and Gregorian Chant and offers an opportunity for awareness that we only really live in the present, here and now. To live according to the real rhythms of the day is, as Steindl-Rast puts it,

…to live responsively, consciously, and intentionally directing our lives from within, not being swept along by the demands of whatever happens. By living in real rhythms, we ourselves become more real. We learn to listen to the music of this moment, to hear its sweet implorings, its sober directives. We learn to dance a little in our hearts, to open our inner gates a crack more, to hearken to the music of silence, the divine life breath of the universe.

In 2017 I choose to stop more often, breathe, and be grateful for the gift of life and the Hours of opportunity and possibility it brings. I choose to seek the silence and in that timeless space of eternity experience my Oneness and even find clarity to tie vision together with action. Seeing the hours of my life from a higher viewpoint, beyond societal expectations and successes I find joy.

If you would like to experience the bells and Gregorian chant of the Hours, Steindl-Rast has an interactive website at http://gratefulness.org.

by Leah Hamilton