While it's going to be hard. I decided that I need to simply stop shopping. At least for some months. Shopping can give you the illusion of control. If I suddenly had more things I would feel better for a time. I don't know why exactly. I know I have various issues including a fear of running out. A fear that runs deep. A fear that is baseless.
I've also hit a wall in my writing at the moment. I managed to finish the book on the scientist that I mentioned in my last blog post. But it brought no consolation. I found it to be in general while written. As far as that goes. But it gave no lift. There was nothing consoling.
But there are times in life where you're not allowed a lot of consolation. When you're a time of waiting, of growing, of loss, of sadness, of uncertainty.
It is these times where what does console me I found in the book The Mountain of Silence. And it is not an easy consolation. But it is one I've lived by.
I'll explain it this way. 20 years ago, a woman from my parish in Ottawa died of cancer. She really used her suffering by God's grace to transform her into a woman who pray deeply and who was no longer afraid of death. A woman who had the blessing to do Bible study from our priest and one of her daughters said how alive it made her feel. She died and her funeral was standing room only.
But there's a lot of mystery in life. Many of those people never started coming to church much. Her spiritual daughter left the church. The same one who felt so alive in Bible study. I haven't seen these beautiful people in many years now.
But yet her holy life is not in vain. Even if all of us who are still living make mistakes like myself. But this is what I asked the Lord when she died. Actually I was in great pain/grief and it was more of a demand 🤣😳
But apparently it was a good one. Because the Elder in the Mountain of Silence says the same thing. And this is it. It's if I'm to have sorrow. Please let me grow. Please let me mature.
Well. Sometimes that looks like relinquishment. It looks like trusting when you've hit that wall. When your walks are walked alone.
When you're asking God please can I learn just to be in the present? For I have a grave weakness of wanting to imagine a future and I now understand that I must not do that.
I remember when I was in library school and I had such dreams of the future. I was going to have a job. It was going to go well and I could have an apartment and all my pretty things and I would be able to go shopping. See I grew up on the poor side of things and I'd always wanted to go shopping.
Well. God gave me a time when I could go shopping. It wasn't then, as much, it was after I got married. And I liked it. But now I understand something deeper. It's something I always knew, but now I have to face it in a different way.
It's that shopping truly cannot give consolation you're really looking for. Years ago my spiritual father, who since retired told me that it seemed like I thought Heaven was like shopping. 😳🤣🤣🤣 I didn't think I was so shallow. But later I learned that perhaps I was. That perhaps I'm just a normal human being.
But it really doesn't give what you think it can. It can give you the sense of control. That's a big one for us humans. But what if that's not what life is about? What if it's about learning to hand your life to the Lord?? What if it's to learn to surrender to Christ?
I'm still very much in process of that. But even as God helps you perhaps make some sort of progress, there's always so much more.
I've been assured that I will have many opportunities to practice and learn more humility. 🤣 And I was told that by very caring people.
So God gave me the grace to do the one beautiful thing I could do today. Other than make that really good pasta. Which was easy because it was in a jar and I had already made the meat and just needed to cook the noodles. Just to be clear. But it tasted really good.
But the grace God gave me for today is simply to take this walk. I'm so glad I managed to get out of the house.
Sometimes I wish I could just go on walks. Especially on days like this. It's a warm day. It's sunny and I'm sitting on a bench by the water. I know one day I won't live here anymore. We already know that my husband once retired that we can't afford to live here. New Jersey is very expensive.
So today I must enjoy what I'm given. Somehow I have to learn to be content. It's the same lesson I was given many years ago. It seems the lessons that you need to learn are the ones that need to be on repeat.
Years ago when I was going through a very different sort of hard time, when I didn't have a job and was totally burnt out and then tried so hard to learn French and then ended up running out of money. During those months many months I took a lot of walks. And I had a wonderful Catholic therapist. She really loved God. And one of the things we talked about the most was being with God today.
This involved learning not to worry but also learning to be present to God in the moment. But I understand know, looking back and also in my present.... It also has to do with not being where you cannot be which is the future. And it means to not think about it that much.
So today I'm thinking about how to do that. What does it mean to be with the Lord Jesus today? How can I learn to pray and do what brother Lawrence talked about in the book? Practicing the presence of God?
Sometimes it is a temptation to think we have arrived at some place of stability. Given how I've been incredibly unstable, you would think I would like the words stability. And maybe I'm supposed to. I mean it would be nice if I was more balanced. But at this point in my life I don't actually believe instability spiritually speaking.
Instead, I believe Jesus is the stable one and I'm the unstable one. And while I can learn to have Christ dwell in me more, Christ is still the stable one.
Well. May God help us.
Especially when there comes a time that perhaps we don't have the walks in sunshine near water. I know that will happen at some point in my life. But in all things I need to learn to trust.
I must get back now. I'm still sitting on the bench. I've been writing this essay by talk text.
Of course there's people that read my blog who I don't know. I could only trust that the readers in my blog are friendly and kind. Like the ones who comment.
May God help us. May we learn to see Christ more. May God have mercy on us.
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