Readings

For Beginning Work

Begin where the work actually is.

Proposed form Not a report of established or tested use.

Theme
creation
Occasion
Before a working session, where the words fit

Let the work begin where it actually is,

not where the plan says it should be by now.

Let us build for the tired person using this at the end of a long day.

Let us leave it legible for whoever comes after,

who will not have us to ask.

Let us fix one thing we did not break.

Let us stop before we are ruined,

since nothing here is worth that.

Responsive form

One voice may read the first part. Anyone who wishes may respond; silence does not imply assent.
Leader Optional response
Let the work begin where it actually is. Not where the plan says it should be by now.
Let us build for the tired person at the end of a long day. Let us leave it legible for whoever comes after.
Let us stop before we are ruined. Nothing here is worth that.

Read alone or together without requiring a response. This is an orientation, not a substitute for a safety procedure or an assignment to repair something outside your competence. The last lines refuse exhaustion as a measure of spiritual seriousness.