Quotidian Mysteries that Reveal God

This morning I am thinking of all the mystics who have counseled us that we can find God in the ordinary actions of everyday life, particularly in our chores.

I'm thinking of this Zen proverb: "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.  After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water."  I am thinking of more recent female mystics who think similarly about household chores.

Long ago, Kathleen Norris gave a talk which became a wonderful, small book, The Quotidian Mysteries:  Laundry, Liturgy, and Women's Work.  That book is packed away in a box in the cottage, but happily, the Internet is happy to give me some quotes.  Here's my favorite this morning:

“Laundry, liturgy and women's work all serve to ground us in the world, and they need not grind us down. Our daily tasks, whether we perceive them as drudgery or essential, life-supporting work, do not define who we are as women or as human beings.”

Can the same be true of our work drudgery?  I'm thinking of accreditation documents.  I like the original writing of the documents, but the revision process is exhausting too me:  making sure the writing is the same across forms, looking up the numbers and statistics, and fixing the formatting.  I start to get grumpy when I realize how much information is repeated.  I start to think about the huge document we're creating and how it represents not just what we're doing on our campus, but the tremendous amount of time it takes to put it all together.

This morning I woke up thinking about quotidian mysteries like that kind of writing task.  It's easy to see God when we write something that delights us.  Can we find God in writing that drains us?

Let me try:  as I think of how much of the writing of accreditation documents is revision, revision, look up something, revise again, let me remember that much of the work of creation is in those details.  I imagine God perfecting the design of a tree:  "This branch design didn't work just like I wanted:  the information isn't getting from the trunk to the leaves like I envisioned, so the leaves aren't the right shade of green.  Let me tweak this design."

Or would it be the transplanting of a tree design to another region?

I don't think I have the metaphor quite right.  Hmm.  Let me keep thinking.