An Injured Soul

Recently, I hurt my back. I got out of bed and pulled something. I do irrigation wok each day at the monastery while I am here in the summer. What do I do? Let my back heal and leave the fields unattended? Or attend to the fields and ignore my back? I decided to rest. Each day, I thought of how the fields were just not getting irrigated. I was impatient to get out there to do the job. But I had to wait until my injured back got whole.

It is the same way with our spiritual life, no? There is always a lot to do in the field of the kingdom. Lots of people and situations need daily attention. But if I don't pull back on a daily basis and rest my soul in prayer, it will become injured, due to neglect. Then I will go out to do my work/ministry attend to daily tasks, but I will do them with some irritability, resentment, or overall bad mood. Of course, the job will be done poorly, and people might wish me to go away and have my fit of discontent elsewhere.

So it is best to let the world go on without my attention for a while each day while I attend to the health of my soul.