Did you ever go to an all-you-can-eat buffet as a kid? I sure did.
The place was called Bonanza, and to me, it felt like the kitchen from Disneyland—chicken nuggets, and cookies, and chocolate pudding cups, oh my!
As a kid with unbridled restraint, I would run through the buffet aisles in every which-way direction, bug-eyed, buzzing with adrenaline, and lost in the sea of options.
My mother would say, “Take only a little bit,” and I would take a little bit of everything!
I found myself in conversation with someone recently and was surprised when the Bonanza memory returned.
As I listened to them talk about their work schedule, and their house projects, and the books they’re reading, and the podcasts they’re listening to, and the volunteer commitments they’re a part of, and their family responsibilities, and the events they’re attending, and the new course they’re considering, I couldn’t help but wonder …
Human tendency is to gorge ourselves at the buffet of life.
We live in an opportune time, and with so many rows of options and opportunities at our disposal, it’s easy to justify how a little bit of everything is still only “a little bit,” right?
Thing is, for as excited as I was to enter Bonanza, I always left feeling bloated and tired.
A little bit here, and a little bit there, always resulted in a plate far too overloaded for any little kid—or adult—to carry or consume.
- I never finished my plate
- I don’t remember the food
- And my buffet M.O. was to take something just because it was there
Looking back, now as an adult, the thing that strikes me most is this:
The actual buffet itself is not the memory that lingers. What lingers are the sprinkles.
Tucked far away, in the furthest corner of the restaurant, overshadowed by the other rows of dessert, there was a lone ice cream station boasting nothing but simple, vanilla ice cream, and a dispenser of sprinkles.
While everyone else was attracted to the decadent chocolate toppings, the decorative drizzling sauces, and the heaping piles of colourful icing, I was mesmerized by sprinkles.
As you sit with today’s prompts, and as we continue exploring the soul work of simplicity, spend time considering the following:
- What are you potentially adding to your life plate that perhaps you don’t need?
- As you enter each week, how do you feel? And as you exit each week, how do you feel?
- In your daily buffet of life choices, where are the sprinkles—the touches of delight, the details of wonder, and the colourful dispenses that make your life “sweet?”
In your daily buffet of life choices, where are the sprinkles—the touches of delight, the details of wonder, and the colourful dispenses that make your life “sweet?”
May today’s intermission invite you into sprinkles of simplicity—where a small bowl of vanilla ice cream is enough in a buffet of “all-you-can-eat.”
—With Joy
Pause for Thought
“Wisdom teaches prudence and temperance, which say, ‘Travel light.’ We don’t have to stuff ourselves in order to satisfy ourselves. And we need to know how much is enough. Which is good counsel not only for filling our plates but also for funding our portfolios.”
Source The Message by Eugene Peterson, We Need to Know How Much is Enough; Proverbs 23:4-5.Spiritual Disciplines Handbook, by Adele Ahlberg Calhoun, p.85.
Pause for Thought
“Remember to conduct yourself in life as if at a banquet. As something being passed around comes to you, reach out your hand and take a moderate helping. Does it pass you by? Don’t stop it. It hasn’t yet come? Don’t burn in desire for it, but wait until it arrives in front of you. Act this way with children, a spouse, toward position, with wealth—one day it will make you worthy of a banquet with the gods.”
Source Stoic Philosophy, The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday, Epictetus, ENCHIRIDION, p.59.
Pause for Thought
“There are two wings that raise a man above earthly things – simplicity and purity. Simplicity must inspire his purpose, and purity his affection. Simplicity reaches out after God; purity discovers and enjoys him. No good deed will prove an obstacle to you if you are inwardly free from uncontrolled desires.”
Source The Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, via, The Lion Christian Meditation Collection by Hannah Ward and Jennifer Wild, Inward Freedom, p.361.
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If these little guys. aren’t sprinkles of delight, I don’t know WHAT is!
