I enjoy walking labyrinths. Labyrinths are maze-like structures that have been used as spiritual tools for centuries. There are many of them around, and I am in the habit of trying to visit a lot of them. For more information about labyrinths, check out The Labyrinth Society. Find where labyrinths are in your area at the Worldwide Labyrinth Locator.

This labyrinth is located at Drew University in Madison, New Jersey. It’s a 7-circuit medieval style, and was an intriguing challenge to walk. It was made of three main elements – a stone path, grass walls, and all of it covered by a thick carpet of fallen leaves!

The question I brought in was this: “How can I rest when I’m looking at a busy and uncertain week?” You can guess why this question was on my mind – I was looking at, well, a busy and uncertain week ahead of me. Meetings with uncertain outcomes, visits that needed to happen but I didn’t know when, a sermon whose preparation time was very unclear, that kind of thing. I was anxious about the coming week, and when I’m anxious, I find it hard to rest, even though I had to.

It was a real challenge to walk this labyrinth. So many leaves! It was so hard to see the path, I had to keep kicking them out of the way as I walked, in order to see where the turns were. I had to pay so much attention to what I was doing.

And that, I started to realized, was what it takes to rest when I’ve got apprehension and anxiety about what’s coming up. I have to do things that take my attention, and mindfully dive into them. No numbing with video games. I wrote this in my journal just after walking: “Numbing isn’t rest. Rest is active, mindfully, but it’s fun and without a particular goal. I don’t know if what I jut wrote is right. But what is right, I think, is that real rest, Sabbath rest, involves a deliberate choice, and is done mindfully. I can do that today.”

I went home that day, and I tried to really rest. I read. I watched Doctor Who. I messed around with my kids. I tried. The funny thing is, I never wrote up this blog post. As I’m writing this, it’s been almost two weeks since I walked this labyrinth (and the one I posted yesterday, for that matter). I’m still struggling to rest and to get stuff done. I’m still getting distracted. I’m still fighting with numbness. But I’m trying.