practicing and NOT practicing are the same...

Today I returned to the spiritual practice of baking bread. I haven't done much of it in about a year's time. We were preparing this time last year to head to California for the wedding or Jennifer and Ross. What a wild and wonderful adventure that was: full of renewal and deep connections. We also had time to visit my brother Phil and his dear wife Julie in San Francisco. And upon our return I was given to building our vegetable garden terraces and learning about our land. Summer came and went and it was too hot to bake and autumn and winter seemed too full. I knew I was missing it all, but to every thing there is a season and it clearly was not the one for fresh bread.

I gave it a try last night - and it was a screaming failure. I knew from the start that it was going to be a bowling ball. And it was - yet everything that went wrong was instructive. In The Soul of a Pilgrim Christine Valters Paintner quotes the Zen Buddhist physician, Jon Kabat-Zinn, from the University of Massachusetts School of Medicine just down the turnpike in Worcester. "Zinn writes that doing yoga and not doing yoga are the same."

What he means is that when we return to our practice after having left it for several days (or weeks, months, years) we often have a deeper appreciation for what we have neglected. We can come back to our practice with a perspective born of wisdom. (p. 16)

I have experienced that this week in returning to playing/practicing music. Since the New Year, I haven't given much attention to music. I have missed it, to be sure, but there never seemed to be time to sit down and concentrate given all that was taking place in L'Arche and then in the pandemic. "Kabat-Zinn asks, 'Can you see that not practicing is an arduous practice?'" Valters Paintner adds: "I believe this means that we each have a life practice, even if it is no practice at all... When we have no intentional practice, we might find it difficult to deal with the grief and struggle of life."

When pain comes, it might be magnified if we can't center ourselves through intentional practice... Intentional practice can anchor us when we are in the middle of the ocean during a hurricane.... So we need practices to act as touchstones so they can sustain us during the journey. They help remind us that the journey will take us beyond our narrow visions and connect with the sacred ground of being.

Slowly reclaiming a return to music-making - and contemplative prayer - has readied my heart for baking. They are all ways of staying grounded in grace. They also open me to realities larger than myself and remind me that there is so much in life beyond my control. I knew from the start that last night's bread was a flop. But, as I do so often, I white-knuckled it, trying to redeem that which was already gone. In the end, I rolled it out and attempted to turn it into a flat bread - and that was a mess, too. So today I made certain that the flour was not too cold. And the yeast was not mixed with the salt. I measured it all with precision and stirred the first four cups 100 strokes. After adding the other two cups of flour, I counted 100 rounds of kneading as well, making certain not to add too much extra flour to the emerging loaves. I pre-heated the oven so that the baby bread could rise in a warm, safe place until it is ready for baking. Like Kabat-Zinn noted, doing it and not doing it are the same - although they yield different insights.

Now it is time to wait. The poet, Luci Shaw, captures the blessings born of honing practices built upon a foundation of everyday experience. It is the sacramentality of the ordinary - a truly holy way of being that is so easily overlooked - it feels right.

Signs by Luci Shaw

In time of drought, let us be
thankful for this very gentle rain,

a gift not to be disdained
though it is little and brief,

reaching no great depth, barely
kissing the leaves' lips. Think of it as

mercy. Other minor blessings may
show up—tweezers for splinters,

change for the parking meter,
a green light at the intersection,

a cool wind that lifts away summer's
suffocating heat. An apology after

a harsh comment. A word that opens
an unfinished poem like a key in a lock.