Chores

Apparently Leipnitz claimed that we live in the best of all worlds. I guess there must have billions of people since then who would have disagreed with this statement at one point in their lives. Perhaps you can say instead that we live in the most useful world for developing our soul, taken into consideration the karmic debt that each of us still has to live through.

You will not believe it, these thoughts went through my head when I pulled out the lawn mower yesterday. I am one of the few people in my neighborhood who does the yard work myself. Ten years ago, before my children were born, my wife and I lived happily in an apartment in Boston and the very thought that I would take on the wilderness on a sacred weekend day would have made me cringe. Well, a lot has changed since my children were born and it suddenly makes perfect sense to me.

Actually, my 4-year old son is helping me, if you can believe it. There are only two activities when I can really channel his limitless energy, yard work and sports. The other day I was working on a project that required shovelling sand on a wheelbarrow and at one point we had to carry our crying boy inside when we felt it got too much for him, "but Papa", he screamed, "the job isn't finished". Amazing stuff, no wonder Bob the Builder is his hero.

So the thought I had yesterday, is that many mundane things have their meaning. Working in the yard is truly spiritual. You have to have an eye for everything, you enjoy the growth and expansion, and you have to accept the decay and death of plants. I know that ten to fifteen years from now our children will have better things to do, and most likely, so will I. I see myself writing books when I have more time, and will probably look out of the window on a sunny Saturday afternoon and see a professionally landscaped yard and will think to myself that this too is perfectly right at this moment.