There's a new song on my country radio station...I think the name is Life Changes. That's what it's all about at any rate. Yesterday as I was driving and hearing that song, I recalled how my life changed almost the instant I realized (which took long years to get to) that I have but one character defect: I take myself too seriously.
All other defects of character come and go in my life but they are as little orphans in the dark...alone and harmless...until they bump against that Big One. Ah, they've found a home. Yes, self-centered is mine...oh, and fear of being wrong in public? Ummm, ummm, ummm. But why list them? They're all there. However, sitting in my favorite chair, reading the latest J.D. Robb, do they bother me? No. Put down the book, and, just in passing, remember the mistake I made in front of Gertrude, my nemesis, SPROING...they have a home, and they're building a fire in the fireplace.
Here's the good news...that's what happens if we're doing it right! How else do we learn our powerlessness? Why seek a power greater than our self if we don't need one?
Our reasoning mind's plan of action: Have a regret? Stop it. Now, walk free.
Who's kidding whom? If we could do that, we surely would do that...and miss completely the wonder of God's forgiving love, not to mention the warmth of a friend's identifying with us and our regret. And laughing with us about it.
The great and glorious gift of rues, regrets and remorses is that they are not only harbingers of spiritual growth...they are one with our spiritual growth.
As Fr Richard Rohr wrote in his July 27th Daily Meditation: If we deny that the spiritual can enter the material world, then we are in trouble, since that is exactly what we are—fully spiritual and fully material human beings. * * * We are supposed to struggle with this, otherwise, we are not sincerely engaged with it.
Short form: Trust God, love, laugh, and get over our self.
Thank you.
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