An excerpt from A Year of Living Biblically, by A.J. Jacobs, in which a secular Jew attempts to live by all the laws in the Bible. On this particular day, he’s acknowledged that, even though he still doesn’t belive in God, he’s started to enjoy prayers where he gives thanks. Before he eats hummus and pitas, he thanks the people that picked the chickpeas, that baked the pitas, that designed the packaging for the hummus, etc.

“The prayers are helpful. They remind me that my food didn’t spontaneously generate in my fridge. They make me feel more connected, more grateful, more grounded, more aware of my place in this complicated hummus cycle. They remind me to taste the hummus instead of shoveling it inot my maw like it’s a nutrition pill. And they remind me that I’m lucky to have food at all. Basically, they help me get outside of my self-obsessed cranium.”