Becoming Light: An Extra-Traditional Journey from Black Friday to December 24

Whether you’re a religious person looking to enrich your experience, a secular person wanting to find some meaning in these days, a tired person just wanting something to newly energize your sense of the season, or whoever, Becoming Light, is a little recipe for a new, expansive experience of these days that stretch and dance and seduce and carry us from the day after Thanksgiving through till December 24.

Each week has a theme. It’ll be explained at the outset of the week, on the first day. The themes grow out of the traditional themes and readings that have been part of the Judeo-Christian tradition for a few centuries, give or take, now—and that were, in some part, historically, correlated to this time of year in relation to even older spiritual traditions among the tribes and peoples of the Earth for many, many centuries.

We’ve tried to make doing so easy by organizing the whole book by date, specific to this year (2013.) There’s one reflection for each day from the day after Thanksgiving till the day before Christmas. (Seriously, could this be easier?)

On each day, you’ll find four little sparks to fan into flame in your own life:

Today’s Spotlight—an intention or a mantra to frame the day

Today’s Lamplight—a brief reflection offered to inspire deeper thinking on the Spotlight

Today’s Inner Light—a question (sometimes a few questions!) for you to carry into your self, intended to bring the focus home and help you figure out where this fits into YOUR journey of Becoming Light. (You may want to get a notebook or use an online tool to journal about these questions!)

Today’s Starlight—a creative action geared toward shining today’s light into the world around you

And you know what else? We’re a little like those famous WisePeople, the three who set out with a star in sight, looking to the skies, open to the journey without any real idea where it would lead them.

So it’s okay if you fall behind a little bit, and need to make up time the next day; or if you move a little ahead of the pace so that you can rest up a bit later when you really need it. (I’ve been known to take good long naps in the middle of a trip, trusting that I’ll be exactly where I’m supposed to be when I wake up again—though not while driving. Please do not take this as literal advice for driving a car. That’s a whole different book, and I think you can pick it up for free at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.)

It’s time now.

Let’s go.

We’re Becoming Light.