Here is why I love to travel: it pulls me out of the routine and inspires me to
think beyond myself, to try new things and explore unbeaten paths and reach for
the moon. Too often in my day-to-day life I surrender to a current which shoves
me here, pushes there, and deposits me where I need to be. In other words, I coast,
allowing the tides of circumstance and the rhythm of routine to take over.
But
what I’ve learn time and time again is that coasting leads us nowhere at all …
I was coasting.
This was the sobering thought that swirled through my head as I sat in silent prayer while waiting for Mass to begin.
Coasting through life -- doing the minimum, checking off the requirements, crossing out the to-do's -- but not taking opportunities to be more: more kind, more generous, more spiritual, more patient, more charitable.
And by not being better or by not doing more meant that I had been ... what? Languishing? Mediocre?
No wonder I wasn't happy with myself. God calls each and every one of us to holiness, and holiness wasn't even on my radar.
Or was it? Could these feeling of dissatisfaction and restlessness be a gentle reminder to make some changes? To swim with the current, or against the current, but not allow it to simply sweep us along? I thought of John Paul II who said that the call to holiness was not only a state, but a task; that we are not so much called to attain perfection, as to strive for perfection.
To strive. To endeavor. To venture. I pondered this a few minutes.
I once read that in our walk of faith, one either goes forward or one goes backward, but one does not stand still.
This, then, was what God was telling me: I can't be better or do more unless I strive to be better or do more; that unless there is the task, nothing is accomplished. This is not to say that to strive is synonymous with success, but that the attempt is better than nothing at all.
This was the sobering thought that swirled through my head as I sat in silent prayer while waiting for Mass to begin.
Coasting through life -- doing the minimum, checking off the requirements, crossing out the to-do's -- but not taking opportunities to be more: more kind, more generous, more spiritual, more patient, more charitable.
And by not being better or by not doing more meant that I had been ... what? Languishing? Mediocre?
No wonder I wasn't happy with myself. God calls each and every one of us to holiness, and holiness wasn't even on my radar.
Or was it? Could these feeling of dissatisfaction and restlessness be a gentle reminder to make some changes? To swim with the current, or against the current, but not allow it to simply sweep us along? I thought of John Paul II who said that the call to holiness was not only a state, but a task; that we are not so much called to attain perfection, as to strive for perfection.
To strive. To endeavor. To venture. I pondered this a few minutes.
I once read that in our walk of faith, one either goes forward or one goes backward, but one does not stand still.
This, then, was what God was telling me: I can't be better or do more unless I strive to be better or do more; that unless there is the task, nothing is accomplished. This is not to say that to strive is synonymous with success, but that the attempt is better than nothing at all.
photos: St. Patrick's Cathedral, NYC
No comments:
Post a Comment