November 1, 2021
The Small (Grand) Gesture
There are obvious signs that I am in the throes of book-writing. My refrigerator—and the Indian takeout that should have been thrown away days ago. My office—and the towering stack of paperwork. My inbox—and the unreturned emails. (If you’ve emailed me in response to one of my recent letters, I’ve only recently found some of those replies in my junk mail. I fear some may have been lost entirely, and I’m sorry about that!)
I find it very difficult, in the middle of book writing, to pay attention to other things, other people. I get so intensely preoccupied with the ideas that on many days, the first thought I wake up to is something like, “I could begin that section with the prayer about progress, then connect it to the John Cassian quote about the monk in his cell.” Book-writing feels like a knotted necklace, one you’re working at constantly. Imagine that necklace and the motion of those hands. What else would they be good for?
On the one hand, I accept that this is the nature of the work, especially at this stage. I accept that it isn’t always like this preoccupying. On the other hand, I find it necessary to give myself little scolding speeches like, “You can’t give up on your life just because you’ve writing a book.” I remind myself to keep at small gestures. Open the mail. Scan some financial documents. Visit a sick friend. Pray for my small group. Plan a date night with my husband. Mail a birthday present. Even write this newsletter.
It’s the small gesture that Gretchen Rubin reclaims in her book, The Happiness Project. She opens her book thinking about all the things she hopes to do:
“One day, I’d stop twisting my hair, and wearing running shoes all the time, and eating exactly the same food every day. I’d remember my friends’ birthdays, I’d learn Photoshop. I wouldn’t let my daughter watch TV during breakfast. I’d read Shakespeare. I’d spend more time laughing and having fun, I’d be more polite, I’d visit museums more often, I wouldn’t be scared to drive.” None of her aspirations are an attempt at grand, sweeping change. Instead, they’re about small habits and practices which, when repeated over and over, accumulate mass.
I told my friend that Rubin’s project feels to me like a resistance project—resistance to acedia, that deadly sin of sloth. As medieval Christians understood sloth, it was not simply laziness. It could also be busyness. What counted was your refusal to keep doing the work God had given you to do, even the work of consenting to your own transformation.
The quote I woke up thinking about today was from John Cassian, a 5th century monk. In his Institutes, Cassian imagines a monk who is compelled away from his barren cell (and his commitment to prayer) to visit the sick and widow. He justifies this violation of vocation by valuing ministry to the sick and widow more than prayer. “It would be a great and pious work,” he tells himself. “A very holy thing.”
“On such things it behooves him to expend his pious efforts rather than to remain, barren, and having made no progress, in his cell.” Acedia is characterized by exactly this kind of inner restlessness, by contempt for the demands of one’s calling. It seeks escape.
What then is the antidote for acedia? How do we fight it? One desert-dweller gave very simple advice. He prescribed the small gesture.
“Perform the humblest of tasks with full attention and no fussing over the whys and wherefores.”
In other words, keep opening the mail. Keep making dinner. Keep returning emails. Keep calling your mother. Don’t imagine that progress will be made overnight on the grand ambitions of your life—because what does progress mean anyways?
Just keep plodding along today, tomorrow, next week, asking for God’s help.
Yours,
Jen