Most of us grow up thinking the sacred belongs to temples or mountaintops. Something out of reach, reserved for special times and special people. But the older one gets, the more it becomes clear: the sacred is far less picky. It seeps into the cracks of daily life, showing up in places we don’t expect, or maybe just forget to notice.
Richard J. Choura, in Enrichment of the Self and Soul, talks about how self and soul are not just lofty concepts, but living parts of us that reach for meaning in a noisy, mechanical world. Metaphysical isn’t some rare air that only philosophers breathe. It’s in the way we experience a sunrise, or the way silence can feel fuller than sound. It’s everyday life, seen with a deeper lens.
Take symbols, for instance. Humanity has always used them to connect the seen and the unseen. A circle, a flame, a song, each points to something bigger than itself. But even in our own kitchens, symbols are at work. That chipped mug you keep using? It’s more than ceramic. It’s memory, continuity, the story of your mornings. Suddenly, a coffee mug is not just a mug; it’s a small emblem of your existence, holding both body and soul together in ritual.
Or think of the self, not the busy, scrolling, appointment-keeping self, but the quieter self underneath. The one that feels the breeze before naming it or pauses at the sight of a child’s drawing on the fridge. That self is always in dialogue with the eternal, even if you don’t call it that. The sacred shows up as an invitation to notice that dialogue.
And maybe this is the real secret: metaphysics isn’t locked away in books of philosophy. It’s tucked inside your commute, your laundry, your sigh at the end of a long day. Choura writes that to lift the self is to glimpse our likeness to the Supreme, not in grand gestures, but in the way ordinary moments reveal wholeness when we give them our attention.
There’s also something to be said about the soul, that inner compass pointing us toward depth when life feels flat. The soul isn’t chasing perfection. It’s hungry for connection, for symbols that bridge the gap between the seen and unseen. That’s why even something as simple as lighting a candle or stepping barefoot into grass can feel like a sacred act. It’s not the flame or the ground itself; it’s the way your soul recognizes a mirror of its own longing for eternity.
And here’s the wild part: the more we lean into those ordinary sacred moments, the more our perspective shifts. Life doesn’t feel like a string of disconnected errands anymore. It starts to feel like a pattern, woven with meaning, threaded with symbols, humming with a quiet kind of divinity. The sacred doesn’t wait for Sunday service or a pilgrimage. It’s already waiting in your living room, your neighborhood, your heartbeat.
So yes, the sacred hides in plain sight. In weeds pushing through sidewalk cracks. In laughter that interrupts sorrow. In the ordinary rituals that shape our days. When we stop treating life as background noise, we find that the self and the soul are already participating in something vast, something divine.
It turns out we don’t have to chase eternity. It’s already here, disguised as the everyday.
Purchase Enrichment of the Self and Soul by Richard J. Choura via these links:
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- Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Enrichment-Self-Soul-Richard-Choura/dp/B0CVNPNJFT/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0
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