Sabbath by Wayne Muller

 I rate this book 4/5

If you are anything like me- constantly feeling the need to 'do' something, always tackling several things at once, feeling like you can never really relax- then this is the book for you! One of my very favorite sites, Bloom, chose this book and it was a great read. I highly recommend this to anyone of any age. Oh, don't forget to check out the discussion videos at Bloom.

If only I had found this little jewel of a read 6 years ago.

Here are just a few of the passages that stuck to me like crazy glue.

And so we are given a commandment: Remember the Sabbath. Rest is an essential enzyme of life, as necessary as air. Without rest, we cannot sustain the energy needed to have life. We refuse to rest at our peril- and yet in a world where overwork is seen as a professional virtue, many of us feel we can legitimately be stopped only by physical illness or collapse.

We reward our captains of industry, our real estate tycoons and investment wizards with outrageous wealth and success. At the same time, people who work with those precious things that grow only in time- caring for children, making peace in troubled communities, harvesting the crops that feed us- these people are invisible, necessary but easily replaced, a dime a dozen.  This economic perversity slowly corrodes the fabric of the human family.

Jesus' most poignant prayer- prayed when he knew he was soon to die- was simply this: "Thy will be done." This is not defeat or resignation, but astonishing faith that there are spiritual forces that will bear him up, regardless of the outcome.  Often in our striving for a particular result, we are not willing to be surprised by a healing we cannot imagine, Paradoxically, it is often cowardice that makes us hold on to our own small solutions; it takes infinitely more courage to surrender.

Remember the Sabbath, and keep it holy. Sabbath time is set apart for remembering the holiness of life. If we speed up and saturate ourselves with accomplishment and worry, we may define what is sacred with our mindlessness. Time is the key. Time, and attention. If we grab a sandwich as we run out the door, this is eating, If we take a small crust of bread and a sip of wine, in a mindful gathering of other beings, this is a sacrament. It is neither the food nor the eating but the time and the mindfulness that reveal what is holy.

Note: While this book focuses primarily on the Christian faith, it does have a few ideas that stem from buddha and other religions.