A sacred space
I think spirit is in all things, so am wary about ways of thinking that suggest anywhere could be ‘unsacred’. However, the kinds of relationships we have with spaces will inform how spiritual we feel in them. There are places that are more sacred, I think. I like cathedrals for the atmosphere of love and reverence built up over centuries. I love Avebury for the same reasons. I struggle to feel a sense of sacred connection on garage forecourts, in crowded shopping centres and on traffic islands. That’s as much about how I am interacting with the space as anything else.
One of the features of the boat, is that we do not have a permanent bed. Narrow boats being six feet wide, double beds are tricky. Permanent single beds pose no problems, but our solution rolls back and forth on a daily basis. Most of the time, the bed is not a bed. It creates practical issues around illness, and means if I want to go to bed early, the chaps have to as well. We’ve managed this with no trouble at all over the last two years, but the arrangement was making me feel sad. It has taken me most of the time we’ve been here to figure out why this is.
Most of my more private spiritual activity happens in bed. The things that are most important in my private practice, and the things I hold most sacred; dreaming, prayer, meditation and making love are all bed based. Certainly, prayer and meditation don’t have to be, but my preference has always been to work along the edges of sleep at the start and end of each day. A bed that is not always a bed, is not able to hold that space in the same way. I can’t decorate it, or support aesthetically what I’m doing. I can’t retreat to it at need because most of the time, the bed does not exist as a bed. I’m starting to realise how much I need a bed as a permanent structure.
A bed should be a place of peace, rest and trust. It should be a happy place. Warm, comforting, relaxing, secure. That’s one area of anxiety I’ve largely dealt with. Going to bed is a happy thing now, not a fearful thing. I look back at my history and wonder how on earth I tolerated some aspects of my past. But then, a sleep deprived person does not think too well, and I endured years of not being allowed to sleep when I needed to. I don’t wake up to panic attacks all the time now, and I don’t have nightmares every night – I’m down to maybe once or twice a week, which is bearable. There is less fear in me, and this bed is a good place.
Sacred places do not have to be altars and temples, self-announcing in terms of their use. We might look to nature for our inspiration, for groves to gather in and spaces to love. However, there is nature in so much that we are and do. The kitchen and the hearth are no less places of connection with scope for sacred relationship. The bathtub may be your place of prayer and contemplation. These days the centre of the home seems to be the sofa and the television, which does not lend itself to a sense of sacred relationship. The sofa and the spinning wheel would though, or any other kind of craft space. Going out in search of nature is important, but seeing how nature is with us all the time, in everything we do, also matters.
Where are you at your most spiritual? What gives you a sense of connection? If we want a spirituality that is part of life, not a bit set aside, then places of doing and living will also be our sacred spaces.
