Gauntlet of the Gridlock to Gifted Grace

Have you ever trimmed your toenails in the car? I’m not talking about as a passenger either. On the driver's side. At a series of red lights and stop signs. You know, because having ten gnarly digits to deal with and safety precautions to consider, there is strategy involved. I’m fully aware, for many, discussing feet is taboo. But, for our purposes here, are you willing to admit you’ve done it? And if you haven’t, buckle up, don’t let the talons talk deter you. There is something in this for all of us.

I was twelve vehicles deep at a back road intersection with only so much as a stop sign guiding the long line of cars onto a major thoroughfare. It wasn’t unusual for this part of the commute to be backed up; even worse if someone were trying to turn left. Life was full and my every minute tenuously scheduled so this full-time working, two-hour commuting, mother-of-three could survive. If it wasn’t scheduled in the routine, it likely wouldn’t happen. It was May in the midwest and with weather unusually cooperating, I had regretfully decided to wear open-toed shoes to work. Zipping through the morning, two drop offs and four zip codes already visited, I was oblivious to the status of my feet until this fine moment of halted traffic. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and I was prepared with a travel grooming kit for a moment such as this. The extra 90 seconds it would take in the parking lot at work to accomplish this task would surely make me late so multitasking in this moment was the only answer. The skilled choreography achieved that day is how legends are made. Gas and brake pedals maneuvered with my non-dominant foot while the other half-way in the air. One hand balancing the task of steering while the other trimming just shy of the pinky toe’s tender quick. All at a snail’s pace of stop and go, bumper to bumper, rush hour traffic. It was an impressive and semi-frightening feat of dexterity. Only just shy of the norm for many of us commuters. Thankfully, I’ve learned a thing or two about rushed commuting since.

Whether or not your feet are in a similar condition, we are all still grinding through life. Aren’t we? The daily grind of commuting is a reality for many of us working outside of the home. An endless loop of back and forth. To the workplace and home. Day after day after day. On the good-ish days: A phone call to keep you company. The coffee house drive-through. Fitting in personal hygiene opportunities because there is little time to fit it in elsewhere. On the bad ones: Traffic. Weariness. Early contractual start times. Running late. Road rage.

“The grind loses its grip when we are instead already and always Home.”

Our commutes are liminal spaces. But what if they transformed into sacred ones? A space acting as your GPS to always find Home wherever you are. The grind loses its grip when we are instead already and always Home. Is it possible we are searching for the nearest Starbucks, a short cut, or the rogue flung toenail as distractions to something else? What if that which we are searching for is really faith-filled flourishing?

What if there was a way to transform not only our gauntlet of the gridlock but also our faith? I’ve lived through the gauntlet and have also been graced with this transformation of faith. Years of unpredictable traffic, no work-life balance, and strategic toe nail trimming clouded my days. Like many of us, existential crisis arrived in the form of a universally shared trauma of a global pandemic. As an educator frontline worker, I began to question my mortality in the car as my commuting resumed to empty streets and toward unknown health hazards. It was here, in this space, Jesus met me and replaced fear for faith. This seed of faith has grown to become the Sacred COMMUTE. A practice for faith-filled flourishing while on the go. Not a manual for how to get to heaven, but a way to foster a relationship with Heaven Himself in the here and now.

There are many ways to practice spiritual disciplines. I just couldn’t seem to find ones which worked for the burned out professional version of myself. Prior to this, there were two bubble wrapped seasons of my professional years where my faith grew: maternity leave and quarantine. Without the trek from home to career I was better able to apply spiritual disciplines and live a more peaceful and hopeful existence. These bubble wrapped seasons were special and formative yet I feared what my habits would succumb to once the artificial margin in my life resumed to grinded living again. I was right. Each time I returned to the commuting routine, my faith would drift back to my Jesus-adjacent default rather than Jesus-immersed lifestyle.

The Sacred COMMUTE organically developed. From not only living a warp-speed life but from then hitting rock bottom. Time and again, this is where He prefers to do His most miraculous work. These practices became the answer to how I could tether myself to our Maker when maxed out of margin. And it was in my most grief-filled season where God’s strength and provision divinely timed to redeem my broken story. I began to capture the commuting moments. Patterns emerged and, in time, became the Sacred COMMUTE practices to be shared beyond the four walls of my mom van.

Practices captured in areas like: 

Calm

Others

Music

Media

Unity

Truth

Echo

These areas illuminated patterns of strategies to use while trekking back and forth. Strategies like connecting with nature even in a concrete jungle. Leveraging music even when singing is not your jam. Unlearning areas of your expertise as an act of growth. Awakening a power already alive within you. Wielding gritty gratitude as a warrior. Accessing your deeper purpose from the messy process of living. And others. All while on-the-go.

If you are a burned out professional, the Sacred COMMUTE practices can help you get out of bubble wrapped seasons of faith, too. You can apply them when life is intense or distracting. When your commute is the only space and time you have. They can be applied out of order and in any sequence. Over time, the Sacred COMMUTE transforms your life and also your faith. In deep and profound ways.

It is:

The calm in your chaos

Seeing others, your people, through His eyes

Your depth of self discovery through music 

Leveraging media as you grow

Your harmony and wholeness in unity with Him

Arming yourself with His armor of truth 

The ripple of His echo in your life.

God’s ways are infinite and I humbly submit to you that there are likely just as many ways for you to seek Him. The Sacred COMMUTE is one of those ways. And if you often find yourself in a routine slog, perhaps in drastic need of a pedicure, it may be the way you find your own faith-filled flourishing, too.