stephen said makes a great point about spirituality – that a lot of the writing on spiritual disciplnes comes from people who have had the luxury of withdrawing to pray. and yet that is not an option available to many of us. so how do we maintain a spiritual life when we are busy, work long hours, have kids etc… as he puts it

the disciplines are imagined by us through this prism of an
extractionist type mould. Even the Brother Lawrence stuff which is
written in the context of engaging God in mundane work type vibe, was
written by a fellow who worked within the confines of a monastery.

As
I wrestle with trying to lead an emergent community into rediscovering
what it means to be the missionary people of God, I find it is not just
trying to re imagine what gathering, engaging in our local community
and being the people of God looks like, but it also requires a re
imagining of what the disciplines look like.

he concludes by asking:

What would it look like were the people doing the bulk of the
communication around the practice of the disciplines look like if they
were full time executives, full time stay at home mums, builders
labourers, corporate workers etc ad infinitum? What are the
alternatives to the Desert Father’s archetype in terms of the practice
of the disciplines?