There’s a lot of talk about routines out there on the internet. The best morning routine for success, routine ideas for moms, daily routines for productivity. Routines can be valuable, but they don’t have be complicated. In this post, I’m sharing my morning routine: a simple prayer.
In high school and college, I spent a lot of time tumbling, balancing, flipping, and leaping across mats and balance beams. I was a gymnast. Really. I did all those things. But when I think about it today? Ouch. But as I said, it was a really long time ago.
I worked hard to practice and perfect a routine, a dance of sorts, especially the floor ex because it was accompanied by music. I did fine. Not at all Olympic fine. But fine. I remembered when to punch it, when to twirl, when to lift up my arms in profound delight. Yes!
Except one time.
The music stopped. Something with the tape player. I had to wait. I was alone on a mat in the middle of a noisy gymnasium. My coach scrambled to figure out what was wrong. It seemed to take forever. My heart pounded.
When the music finally started, I was blank. I completely forgot what came next; I lost my rhythm, my balance. I faked my way through the rest. The judges noticed. I cried. I wish I could tell the 15-year-old me that this would not matter years later.
Yet it actually does matter, in a way, because this memory reminds me of routines and rhythms and balance and how they reveal so much more than the thing itself. How many times since that tumbling routine have I lost my rhythm and faked my way to the end?
Tish Harrison Warren writes about everyday routines in Liturgy of the Ordinary and how things as mundane as bed-making and teeth-brushing may actually be holy practices where we know God is with us. I’m reading my way through this simple yet powerful little book, taking notes, highlighting and examining my routines. My day-to-day habits. The good ones. And, gulp, the bad ones. The ones that make me falter. Social media? And the ones that balance me. Prayer.
In one of the early chapters, Warren talks about remembering our baptism, something I learned and practice every morning in a simple way. Just so you know, this is not my idea. It’s from Luther, and I learned it about the time I learned to do a back handspring.
My Morning Routine: A Simple Prayer
I begin by making the sign of the cross to remind myself of my baptism, to remind myself I am redeemed. Then I say Luther’s Morning Prayer. I share it here for those who may not know this simple yet beautiful prayer:
I thank You, my heavenly Father through Jesus Christ, Your dear Son, that You have kept me this night from all harm and danger; and I pray that You would keep me this day also from sin and every evil, that all my doings and life may please You. For into Your hands I commend myself, my body and soul, and all things. Let Your holy angel be with me, that the evil foe may have no power over me. Amen.
Luther’s Morning Prayer
And now comes the part I really love, the words that follow in The Small Catechism. “Then go joyfully to your work . . .”
It’s really that simple.
Do you have a simple morning routine that reminds you of joy and beauty and forgiveness? I’d love to hear about it.
The post was prompted by the word ROUTINE at Five Minute Friday link-up where Christian writers encourage each other and share their free-writing weekly. It is a privilege to be part of this community. Honesty here. It took my six times longer than five minutes to write this. | Photo by Sarah Cervantes on Unsplash
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