So, I am not a person historically concerned with the dailiness of life. I’m a thinker. A writer. A mystic type. I live in the mysteries and questions of life more than the practicalities of it, and I have always been this way.

This is not quite conducive to real life, though, is it? The dishes need to be cleaned, the laundry needs to be run and folded, and food needs to make its way into our homes, through our appliances and cookware, and eventually onto our tables and into our stomachs.

I fought these realities for much of my childhood and young adult and even mid-adult years.

I would rather read a book than cook dinner. I would rather work on a project than think about the grocery store or filling my car with gas. I would rather have a really great soul-deep conversation than tidy up the house.

Who wouldn’t?

(Ha. I say that knowing full well not everyone is wired like me.)

But the rhythmed life has really changed this for me.

Now there is a place for things to go and a reason for them to be included and to go where they go.

For instance, I mentioned earlier in this series that I do my meal-planning and grocery shopping on Monday afternoons. I sit down at my computer and work out a dinner menu for the week, then go through the recipes and add needed ingredients to the ShopShop app on my phone, and then take off for the grocery store. (I wrote more of the nitty-gritty details of this routine in another online space here.)

I’ve found a real sense of stability and even pleasure from having a routine and time of the week for doing this. In that period of time, I’m completely focused on caring for Kirk and our home through the vehicle of food. When I walk the aisles of the store, noticing how familiar they’ve become, I feel so connected to our home. I feel aware that I am a provider of sustenance for us and that doing this for us allows Kirk to remain focused on his own work, not having to worry about how or what we’re going to eat every day of the week.

It gives the dailiness a greater sense of purpose, a connection to something higher and important to me.

And then there’s just the joy living inside that space.

Putting away the groceries becomes a familiar puzzle of placing items where they normally go in the fridge. Cooking meals becomes a creative and rhythmed dance, with meals coming together with smoother and seamless ease the more I make our favorite meals. Washing dishes at the sink becomes a meditative time of prayer — often a time when you, the readers here, come to mind and I hold you to the light of God, especially when you’ve shared with me some of your concerns and life realities.

When it comes to the dailiness of life, I’ve learned a rhythmed life is immensely helpful for two reasons: it gives these activities a place to go (a time of day and/or week when they get my attention) and it gives them a measure of purpose.

A place and a purpose. What gift.

How might the dailiness of your life be aided by place and purpose?