Don't Do.

When I worked in organized religion it always seemed ironic that I worked on Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath (Friday night and Saturday). Technically, the point of any Sabbath observance is to rest and desist from working.

As I had Mondays off, realized that when I was taking time off to rest wasn’t as important as that I was taking time off, I transformed my Sunday nights into the beginning of my personal Sabbath observance.

As time has changed, I have moved a great deal of my non-work time to Tuesday afternoon to evenings when I do stained-glass.

Some believe that entrance exam to heaven is based on conformity. I disagree. My experience as the chief religious officer of Religion-Outside-The-Box has taught me to understand importance of intention.

What do you do for your time off? What makes up your weekly Sabbath activity (or
non-activity)?

Inertia is a universal law. Unless you stop, you will probably just keep doing what you are doing — and doing it only because it happens to be what you are doing.

A dear friend of mine whose three-week trip to Africa was canceled at the last minute told me that he just went straight back to work — that is how powerful our "work lives" are.

Parkinson's Law, named after 20th Century British historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson, states, "work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." That's just the way it is.

Paradoxically for adults, it takes work and planning in order to successfully rest.

• Do you ritually create space in time? Are you religious about regularly not-doing or just being? If not, what do you have to lose in trying?

You know you need some time off. So, please, for the love of yourself, be conscious enough to take some time away from your usual doings. In other words, schedule some time in the next six days in which you won’t do.


With love,

-Rabbi Brian

And, if you care to, click here to see comments on the streetprophets site where the article went up on Friday.