I have returned from my business trip. It feels so good to be back home. I hate traveling for business. I was in San Diego and did not have a single opportunity to see anything other than the hotel I was staying in. My whole routine gets disturbed. I’m a homebody and creature of habit. I packed my travel kit for ritual and did not get to pull it out once.
Modern day living can leave little room for magic. If your married, have children and work a full time job then there is very little if any room for solitary time. I do not have children but I am married with a full time job. I have two large dogs and my mother and law lives with me. I have to keep my time for ritual very structured. Sometimes this requires me getting up before anyone else very early in the morning just to have some quiet time undisturbed for meditation. Even though it can take a little juggling and sometimes almost inconvenient for me to find time for my practice I can tell a definite difference if I don’t stay close to my spirituality. It keeps me grounded and centered. I am able to handle challenges better and keep a level head. Below are some tips from personal experience on keeping a practice going in our busy world today.
You can center yourself anywhere – I am very fortunate to have a separate room for my practice. I can go and lock myself up in it whenever I want. Sometimes it may not be the quietest of locations depending on who is home. Many people don’t have a designated space for meditation and magic. Centering oneself and meditation are mental activities which means they can be done really anywhere. If your in the car on the way to work and stuck in traffic instead of being angry about sitting on the freeway take advantage of that time to meditate and set your intention for the day. The point is to get creative! Ive used my lunch break at work to go to my car and meditate, pray or center myself. I’m actually a big fan of using the car as sometimes its the only place where we can achieve privacy.
Meditation is about quality not quantity – Ive written about meditation before. It isn’t about spending an hour trying to remain totally motionless with a blank mind. Certainly you can do that if that’s your form but you do not need to. If all you have time for is a quick ten minute session and your getting benefit from it, that’s great! Form a meditative practice around your wants and needs – and availability. Even five minutes a day can be beneficial than nothing at all. In the long run your sanity will thank you. Even when I was on my business trip I would wake up a little before my meetings started and did a quick meditation and mainly focused on my breath and daily intention. Even that small amount of time helped me stay calm and focused about 4 hours in my marathon meetings.
Vocal declaration may be necessary – Sometimes in my home I’ll have to tell my husband I need some time alone. If you have the ability to tell everyone to scram do it! Have open communication with the people in your household. Ask your husband to take the kids out for a couple hours (which he should be doing for mom anyway). I am open with my husband about my practice and I feel that this has given me more ability to do it freely. I think this is especially important if you have a spouse that is not pagan or spiritual in any way.
Money is not an obstacle for spiritual success – I love online window shopping for new tarot decks and supplies. I think its important to remember these are wants not needs. You need essentially nothing to have a flourishing spiritual practice. All of your shiny bits and bobs are tools for the mind. I am currently renovating my home to sell and sometimes have to take a step back and ask “do I really need this?”. The needs of the family come before my wants. I believe in our modern world where we are all so connected via internet there can be pressure to have the best altar space or largest tarot collection. Live within your means. Remember, one aspect of your spiritual practice (at least for me) is to try to live with less. Your power lies within your mind, not in the amount of material things you accumulate.
Above all I am guilty of my last point. I inherited the shopping gene from my grandmother. This applies to tarot as well. I love to receive new decks in the mail. Its so exciting opening one for the first time. I’m still working through this one myself.
Do you have any creative tactics for your spiritual practice?