Don't Even Try

The idea that you don't have to be emotionally into your intention, your prayer -- it doesn't have to feel intensely good or bad for it to "go through," to reach its mark -- is one I've been thinking about since a monk at the monastery talked about chanting in Latin versus chanting in English. He and I both agreed that the Latin was more satisfying, but it didn't matter how we felt, he said. The act of chanting was enough.

So far this holds true in these Weekly Rites: I'm learning that there is no correlation between how it feels when I'm doing it and how the footage itself turns out -- in effect, I cannot predict the outcome of my efforts; I cannot predict effect. So it's okay to not even try to predict. This is liberating.