"Life is what happens to you when you are busy doing something else".
BY REBECCA SANDBERG
Dailyness is the humdrum, the beat of everyday existence proven to act as a stabilizing factor to the human experiment – that via the habit of caring for oneself, we arrive in a space of being able to care for another and, hopefully, care for the world around us.
And yet, this steady beat, with its deep history and promise of wholeness carries an abysmal reputation - bemoaned and lamented as a sort of manifest destiny of boredom and mortification.
The Mundane
The function of the mundane, or menial, as our path to wholeness is what poet and author, Kathleen Norris (1947 – ) explores in her powerful little work, Quotidian Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy and “Women’s Work”, inviting readers into the mysterious and profound. The idea that none of us can completely remove ourselves from the daily, should give us cause to celebrate, but instead:
The daily routines that provide a modicum of discipline in our lives are perceived as a drag, a monotony that can occasion listlessness, apathy and despair. The word acedia is not much in use these days - a “spiritual torpor or apathy; ennui,” but I wonder if much of the frantic boredom and enervating depression that constitute an epidemic in modern life are not merely the ancient demon of acedia in contemporary dress.
Menial Dailyness
The term “menial”, Norris notes, derives from a Latin word meaning “to remain,” or “to dwell in a household.” In her poetic voice, Norris makes it clear that to remain and dwell in the menial is ultimately about “connection” and “family and household ties”. She states:
But no one can escape daily needs that are met in family living, from the changing of the baby's diapers, to the feeding of ourselves and those closest to us.
Norris explores dailyness as our pathway to wholeness – that reflection in the mirror that is ever desirous of our freedom, wellness, and breath. But, the truth is – that we feel snapped, shattered, and fragmented – we feel acedia in our core. Norris states:
At its Greek root, acedia means ‘lack of care’. Care is not passive - the word derives from the Indo-European word meaning “to cry out” as in a lament. Care asserts that as difficult and painful as life can be, it is worth something to be in the present, alive, doing one’s daily bit. It addresses and acts on the daily needs that acedia would have us suppress and deny.
(….)
The grip of acedia on the human spirit is such that even the great beauty of this land and seascape can be rendered impotent and invisible.
In this conception, "acediadic" dailyness takes on a paramount emptiness that cuts us off from the tingle and zing of seeing the sunrise or the hush and lull of gawking at the moon.
Acedia's antidote
Such a diagnosis explains Norris’s elucidation of acedia’s antidote, which is, after all, a new relationship with the menial – being present in the present reality. Ann Porter, another clairvoyant poet and thinker, in her poetry collection, Living Things, illuminates the necessity of the daily. Norris adds:
The comfortable lies we tell ourselves regarding these “little things” – that they don’t matter, and that daily personal and household chores are of no significance to us spiritually – are exposed to falsehoods when we consider that reluctance to care for the body is one of the first symptoms of extreme melancholia.
Norris lists the ways in which we care – how we, ultimately show respect to ourselves as a way of warding off the demon of acedia:
Shampooing the hair, washing the body, brushing the teeth, drinking enough water, taking a daily vitamin, going for a walk, as simple as they see, are acts of self-respect.
In this respect, the quotidian can serve the same function as, say, good advice from a friend – offering a tender push into life's deep unspoken spaces. Norris admits:
I was slow to recognize that combating sloth, being willing to care for oneself and others on a daily basis, is no small part of what constitutes basic human sanity.
When the company we keep with ourselves is stale and touched with the bitter taste of apathy, perhaps it’s time to reflect on doing the dishes, partake in making bread or relish the idea of washing our hair. It’s a serious endeavor to create a lifelong, happy relationship with happiness.