Joe Paprocki’s fifth question in 7 Keys to Spiritual Wellness is:
What scratches your itch?
…On a spiritual level, we all have an itch. It’s that chronic, gnawing sense of discomfort that begs for a scratch. Most of the time we don’t identify the source of the itch. We just scratch. And scratch. And scratch. We find ways to bring about temporary relief. But it’s only temporary. We often scratch to excess, breaking the “skin” of our soul and causing harm to ourselves without eliminating the source of said itch.
Joe lists some of the ways we bring about temporary relief: shopping, eating, drinking alcohol, using drugs, gambling, smoking, exercising, having sex, playing video games, blogging [!], tweeting, surfing the internet, watching TV and working.
Of course, most of these things, if engaged in with conscious moderation, are not at all harmful, but once we want and need any of them to feel “good,” then we’re on the wrong path.
Oh, dear.
From our friends at Criggo. Is this the final frontier?
Rosemary, one of our Bright Young Things, wants to know what I’m reading. She says it will help people relate to me more easily. For real? Well, here goes.
I’m on a Scottish detective kick. Right now, I’m reading Ian Rankin’s series about Inspector John Rebus and am currently about halfway through Let It Bleed.
I got to Scotland via Scandinavia – a somewhat eccentric way to go, I know. I started with Steig Larson’s “The Girl with the…” trilogy and moved from there to other Northern European detective fiction in translation. Having scooped up all I could find there, I still felt the need to read accounts of dark, brooding and imperfect policemen working in bleak and craggy landscapes. After all, I’m Irish.
John Rebus is great. Sure, he drinks too much, is an insomniac and can’t maintain a romantic relationship, but he’s sharp and determined. He’s constantly on the outs with his “don’t rock the boat” superior officers and will let nothing and no one stand between him and the truth.
I have only two more John Rebus novels to read and I shall be very sad to say goodbye to the inspector when I’ve finished them.
This is a guest post by Denise Gorss.
My mother has a figurine of Mary joyfully holding the baby Jesus. She raises him up playfully, and we see their eye contact and the happiness of a young mother spending time with her child. Mary’s flowing hair and dress convey a sense of motion. It’s an image that appeals to me. This is not the dressed all in blue, beautiful yet motionless Mary conveyed in some Marian imagery. This is the human Mary, the young woman enjoying her son.
It only recently occurred to me that St. Ignatius might have liked this small statue. Ignatius had a strong devotion to Mary. He had a consoling vision while convalescing of Mary with the child Jesus. He held vigil before Our Lady of Montserrat, laying down his sword to begin his new life. Mary also played a role in several other incidents during his lifetime.
The Spiritual Exercises invite the retreatant to imagine Mary’s experience at the Annunciation, imagine being at the Nativity, and imagine standing near Mary at the Crucifixion and rejoicing three days later with her at the Resurrection. These are all moments calling forth deep human emotions. Despite everything she would suffer for her child, Mary the mother first experienced joy in knowing her child as a newborn. Mary is our mother, too. Do we picture her as a far-off queen of heaven, too holy to approach? Or do we picture her as a joyful, approachable mother? Ignatius would have us approach Mary, praying with him to “place me with your Son.”
You take a little seed, plant it, water it, and fertilize it for a whole year, and nothing happens.
The second year you water it and fertilize it, and nothing happens.
The third year you water it and fertilize it, and nothing happens. How discouraging this becomes!
The fourth year you water it and fertilize it, and nothing happens. This is very frustrating.
The fifth year you continue to water and fertilize the seed and then… sometime during the year, the Chinese bamboo tree sprouts and grows 90 feet in six weeks.
Source [slightly adapted] Image by Michele Buzzi under the Creative Commons License
The fourth of Joe Paprocki’s questions in 7 Keys to Spiritual Wellness is:
What’s your security blanket?
For young children security blankets and other such comfort objects are healthy things. They are “transitional objects” to ease the trauma of separating from their mothers. For me, it was my teddy bear, Ya-Ya…
Unfortunately, we tend to replace these plush toys with more sophisticated security blankets, not to ease the anxiety of our separation from our mothers, but to ease our separation from God…
Our adult security blankets are like an ever-widening moat that dig around ourselves to keep the future at bay. We are a society of hoarders, clinging to our possessions because we fear a future in which our happiness, security and comfort are uncertain.
My adult security blanket? I’m embarrassed to admit that I think it’s probably Netflix. I watch a lot of movies downloaded from that service and, if I’m honest, I spent way too much time chilling out in front of the screen. Joe Paprocki reminds us that “our separation from God” is an illusion, but one in which most of us actively participate. What if I were to spend even half the time I use for watching movies to watch instead for God in my life?
What’s your security blanket?
I’m sorry. You’ve heard this from me many times before and you’ll probably have to put up with it again. I am haunted by Mary Oliver’s question:
Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?
I believe that my life is precious and there are moments at least, believe me, when it is pretty wild as well.
But I guess I’m worried that I’m not paying enough attention to living each moment to the fullest and am letting days and weeks and months pass in a kind of a daze.
Help me here. What simple and practical things can we do to be more fully aware that we need to “seize the day”?
Denise pointed me to this extract from Chris Lowney’s Heroic Living and I thought I’d share it with you:
A mentor once told me that the best thing to happen in his career was botching the first major decision he faced. The best thing? Yes, he said. Life went on, he picked himself up, he survived, and he learned that we can often correct mistakes and that life frequently offers second and third chances—not always chances to undo past mistakes but chances to do other good things. So, from that time, he was never afraid to make a decision and never afraid to take personal risk. He lived proactively and modeled a world-loving, world-embracing attitude.
We can’t fulfill our purpose in the world without taking risk and making choices. Our purpose, vision, and values may be our enduring beacons through life, the “port to which we are sailing,” as Seneca put it. But our talents, circumstances, resources, and interests will all change through life, as will the world we live in.
In fact, our choices are the only bridge between where we stand now and the port to which we want to head. Choices are the only path from the civilization we’ve inherited to the civilization we aspire to create.
Choose wisely.
Joining the Jesuits was definitely the biggest risk I ever took and, so far, it has worked out amazingly well. Going to Japan was another and, even though I didn’t stay there, I’m so glad that I spent those years in another culture.
What are the biggest chances you’ve taken? Have they worked out well for you?
This is a guest post by Jane Knuth.
My mom, Dottie, is 89 years old and lives with us. She volunteers for funeral dinners and at the thrift store each week. She drives her four-wheel-drive Jeep only during daylight and avoids taking the freeway. Her book club keeps her reading a novel or two every month, along with the daily newspaper and five magazine subscriptions. She belongs to two ladies lunch groups and one mixed-gender dinner club.
She raised eight offspring, and I expect six of them and their spouses will be here for breakfast on Mother’s Day morning after the 8:45 Mass. Ten out of the 17 grandchildren will also turn up some time during the day. The out-of-state relations will each phone to chat for 20 minutes, which will fill up the rest of Mom’s day.
Because she has a small apartment, the gifts will consist of hanging flower baskets for her porch, edible delicacies, and gift cards for restaurants and bookstores.
After the food is eaten, the gifts unwrapped, the guests departed, and the phone stops ringing, Mom will sit down gratefully in her easy chair and say, “Well, that was a pretty good day. Everyone seems to be doing fine.”
And she’ll pick up a book and start to read.
Jane Knuth is the author of Thrift Store Saints: Meeting Jesus 25¢ at a Time and the new Thrift Store Graces: Finding God’s Gifts in the Midst of the Mess. She has been volunteering at the St. Vincent de Paul thrift store in Kalamazoo, Michigan, for the last 17 years. “Like” her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/janeknuth.
“Master, how do I diligently practice the Tao?”
“When hungry, eat; when tired, sleep.”
“Is this not what most people do?”
“No, no, no! Most people are not like that. Most people, when eating, are full of thoughts and desires, and when sleeping, are full of cares.”
Source [slightly adapted]
