Genuine spiritual experiences don’t sit well with a nine-to-five job.When something truly profound happens to a person s/he requires time to think about it.Ponder the experience.If such a thing occurs on a Sunday (imagine that!), the next morning, still reeling, you need to go to work.Perform duties that no longer seem significant.And continue to do so for four more days, until the fire has gone out.This paradox has plagued me for some time.Perhaps it’s the fate die cast for an editor who can’t just read submissions for their financial payoff.Who asks, “What if she’s right?”Doesn’t that affect everything?Especially in the case of a religion editor.
Blown away.
I first noticed this in college.Even there the schedule was quite flexible, according to classes you had to take.The professors were sincere in their presentation of ideas you should take seriously, but then in the work world your boss indicates that you’re not being paid to do that.You’re being paid to produce.Contribute to the machine.Cogs and sprockets don’t think.They do.Then a significant weekend would come (or a holiday, say) where the message would really speak to me.Change my outlook.Until Monday morning.The outlook would still be changed, of course, but the demands on routine would not also be changed.It’s quite a dilemma.As the great contemplatives throughout history have known, these ideas must be wrestled with.Conversed with.Tried on for size.Walked with.Such things can’t be done in the context of what you’re paid to do.“Do it on your own time.”
What is your own time?The weekend, essentially.Work expands to fill the quiet times of weekdays.Your time is owed to somebody who pays you less than the national average to do something any nonspiritual person could do.Such is the danger of being open to new ways of looking at things.Vacations need to be planned.They are rejuvenating, but spiritual experiences can’t be planned.They just happen.HR has no algorithm for them.Not exactly sick days or floating holidays.And what if you need more than one day?That meeting that was scheduled for Tuesday, what about that?As if such things were really important.Perhaps you too had the professor late for class because s/he was struggling with an idea, an experience that fit her or his specialization.There were always office hours to recover.That’s all fine and good, but it’s time for work.