Awakening to Wholeness is a series of prompts, reflections, and teachings about how holding the tension of opposites can help us to heal division and experience wholeness. If you feel moved to share your own reflections, we invite you to email us with the subject line “Wisdom of Opposites” or tag us on social media with #EHoPWisdomOfOpposites.
At times, the doldrums of monotony seem to suck every last bit of life from reality. Repetition, boredom, and stagnancy mark the pitfalls of our monotonous rhythms. For me, the most difficult of these to deal with is the morning routine: the alarm goes off at the same time every weekday. Same pot of coffee, same measurement of grounds, same samples of peanut butter, jelly and bread for the kids’ breakfast. Every weekday, we run through the repeated cycle of waking, dressing, eating, chatting about any good dreams, brushing hair and teeth, and out the door to get to the bus on time. Most days, my mind is groggy, my energy is low in the morning, and I sometimes wonder what the point of it all is.
Then, more often than monotony might prefer, dynamism steps in, shakes things up, and sends shimmers across the same old patterns of the tapestry of daily life.
Just today, as I took the first few steps back into the apartment after dropping the kids off at the bus, I noticed that the wind had stopped blowing (after two days straight!), and the skies were clear. Sunlight shone on the trees. The same old rhythms shimmered just a bit.
The realization sinks in further. Over winter, the leafless trees appear dull and look lifeless every day. Yet, while they may have slowed down some, the reserved storage of nutrients still shoot up the trunk every day, dynamically vivifying the tree, even if my eye can’t observe the action.
Indeed, monotony and dynamism hold a tight tension. Much like the Benedictine expression of the tension between stability and conversion of life, monotony and dynamism both work on us as we travel the path of transformation.
On the one hand, while dull, monotony lays firm foundations. It is a little easier to deal with change when you’ve been strengthened by the force of repetition, and it is less tempting to be wooed by the pleasures of stimulation if you have gotten used to regularity. On the other hand, while potentially chaotic, dynamism enlivens and carries life force. If things have become stagnant, dynamism helps to break through the containers of control and comfort and certainty.
Overall, I am fairly certain that the Holy One is willing to accompany us through both the doldrums of monotony and the roller coasters of dynamism.
Contemplative Questions
We offer the following questions as prompts to help you reflect on the presence of opposites in your spiritual practice and your life.
- Where do you most experience the monotony of daily life: your morning routine? Your commute? Your workday? Somewhere else?
- How does this regularity support you? Can you notice the ways that your routines or practices strengthen you, even when they feel dull?
- Can you think of moments when dynamism has enlivened the structure of your life, or brought a shimmer to your ordinary patterns? How might you invite dynamism into your life, alongside your routines?
Join the conversation! If you feel moved to share your reflections, we invite you to email us with the subject line “Wisdom of Opposites” or tag us on social media with #EHoPWisdomOfOpposites.
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Christine Luna Munger
Christine Luna Munger, PhD currently serves as the director of the Episcopal House of Prayer. She previously served as Coordinator of the Spiritual Direction Certificate and Professor of Theology at St. Catherine University. She regularly writes, teaches, and leads group prayer sits at EHoP.
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