Do you ever feel like you cannot draw the line between the sacred and the secular, between the spiritual and the mundane? I do. In fact, most of the time I think the mundane is the spiritual. Most of the time I don’t want to draw a line at all, but rather to draw a circle around the whole soggy, wonderful mess.

For instance, in my experience creativity is nearly always spiritual. So are certain kinds of spaces that have a hush and a power, even if it is just the quite corner of a crumbling stone wall or the way my daughter looks while she’s gulping water from the park’s drinking fountain. So much of music is spiritual, especially untrained singing and things that are a little off-key. Oh, and motherhood. Motherhoods is spiritual...umm...sometimes. Like last week, when I had this moment with Cate, and other people noticed the moment too, and spread it around so other could find their way too.

Other times motherhood and spirituality seem to be having a serious disconnect.  Like today, for instance, where motherhood has included:

• yet another national holiday with no school
• the need to care for children in spite of a week-long migraine
• packing up the family for a trip to another country
• and an unsuccessful playdate.

It was the playdate that landed motherhood squarely in the “not spiritual” section today. It ended after a mere 30minutes because one of the children managed to bleed three times in ten minutes; a second child was swelling up from some kind of insect bites; and a third was soaked from chin to waste from “getting a drink” at the water fountain. (Are you sure you don’t call that “taking a shower?”)

On days like this, motherhood does not feel spiritual, or enlightening, or even vaguely poetic. Rather, it feels like a long slow slip into failure--the end result being two kids sitting mind numbingly in front of the television and one mother drinking white wine in an effort to self medicate. Nope. Not spiritual at all.

So imagine my gratitude when I found these wonderful posts from women who shine light on the lovelier aspects of mothering. Renee Alston is writing poetry about loving Gaia (mama-earth) over at Iuana.

Jena Strong of Bullseye Baby is back again this week with a short but sustaining post on a mother’s Shabbat experience with her sleeping (!) family.

And Kate has laid the most holy ground in her words about saying goodbye to one baby, while loving the one who is still physically with her. Kate’s writing at sweet/salty is some of the finest I’ve read, and a must for any fellow traveler who has seen child a leave this world too soon.

May these posts bring you inspiration this week on the (sometimes) spiritual rollercoaster of everyday life. Namaste.

Rachelle is always on the lookout for posts to feature in her weekly editorial at BlogHer. If you blog regularly about spirituality of any variety, email her: moi at magpie-girl dot com.