Riding Swift Camels in the Deserts of our Daily Lives

How dailiness is all apart; an integral part of the spiritual life

Photo by scott dukette on Unsplash

We are already finding out in the New Year that there is a dailiness to our lives that needs attention. It is in the dailiness that we live out this grand adventure; live by faith and stand, slip or slide around in the journey called life.

Today, in the season of Epiphany, I’m thinking of those ancient Magi who rode their camels across the deserts of their own lives and how I must do the same. You, as well. Each day and every day until we reach the Light.

Every day, as fellow Magi, you and I must mount the camels and start riding out following the Star—begging for more light; trusting the whole process of the journey.

Eugene Peterson, famed author of the Message has written, “The only opportunity you will ever have to live by faith is in the circumstances you are provided this very day: this house you live in, this family you find yourself in, this job you have been given, the weather conditions that prevail at this moment.” It is the singular dailiness of the intersection of our lives and circumstances that we live either aware or asleep to what is happening in. us and around us.

We are conditioned, it seems to seek the extraordinary to give our lives flavor and to savor the Adrenalin rush, spiritual mountain tops and what we think is happiness. But the flatlands of each and every day is how we live our days which multiply to months and on to years.

When our days look like going to the podiatrist; buying groceries; filing our taxes and cleaning up after ourselves, the spiritual life can tend to look like a totally other way to live; to be and to desire. Ordinary. Routine. Daily.

But the spiritual life taught to us by Jesus is an embodiment of living out the dailiness of our lives with awareness more than always seeking mountain top moments.

“Living the life Jesus demonstrated comes down to simply living each day well. In the dailiness of our lives the holy meets the ordinary. Glory intersects with the ruin. The sacred meets the routine. The lifelong journey to heaven is often marked with ordinary days where we simply do our work and serve God the best way we believe we can. It may be in the dailiness that we are most deeply tempted to leave our first love when we were smitten with the love of God and love for God and pursue some other wild lover who lures us into believing that some other kind of life may be more gratifying. The abundant life requires a long, steady cadence in the same direction towards heaven. (Except from The Jesus Life).”

This is precisely why Ignatius of Loyola (16^th Century) brilliantly developed what he called, “The Daily Examen.” This is a daily spiritual exercise where one reviews the day with two different filers and questions. He called the filters: What in your past day brought a consolation? And what in the past day brought a desolation? Those are big words that may not be in our lexicon but the basically mean this: What in your past day was beautiful that caused you to think or be aware more of God? And what in your past day brought something brutal—that caused you anxiety or pre-occupation with worry or stress?

Ignatius said that if a person practiced the “Daily Examen” for three months, their life would be changed forever. I’ve practiced the Daily Examen for over two decades now and I can concur—that this practice is the one I would be consider to be the most important exercise we can ever possibly do to cultivate a sense of being alive spiritually.

If you do nothing else in your resolve to walk into this New Year with a keener sense of the spiritual life, the Daily Examen is where I would begin and continue and practice each and every day.

In doing this, we’ll realize that the abundant life really is a daily life; a daily invitation to find God in all things. There is no greater awareness than that: To find God in all things!

Listen to me explain the Daily Examen on my Podcast! Click here!

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