I’ve mentioned before here that I’ve been in something of a spiritual slump recently. It’s nothing I could call a dark night of the soul. I can hardly even blame my soul for it, when it’s mostly my will that’s the problem. As Chesterton wrote it: “Christianity has not been tried and found lacking; it has been found difficult and left untried.” While I’m ready to embrace the hard road at first, I do not usually endure to the end.
I’ve recognized increasingly lately just how very off my ideals and perceptions are. To an extent, I was purer when I was younger and had fewer desires. But when I was younger, I also had fewer temptations. As Kant wrote it: "And how many there are who may have led a long blameless life, who are only fortunate in having escaped so many temptations.”
I am young and busy unconsciously becoming my own person. I am busy, always, determining the things which are most important to me. I am settling issues of right and wrong with myself alone as judge. I am at a pivotal point in my own development, and not only am I unaware of it consciously, but I can’t even begin to fathom how it’s happening and who my influences are.
Lately I’ve been very down on myself. I wonder why I cave so easily to the smallest temptations. I keep wanting to get away, so that I can start a new life, free from the troubles that bind me at home. But I know very well that you can’t outrun your troubles. The problems I have will follow me anywhere. But I’m thinking of running anyway, just to escape the cross I have to bear for just a little while. It’s a rotten thing. But as Shakespeare wrote it: “Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all.”
My brain needs realignment. I know that much. I know that I’m the author of my own displeasure. What I most fervently crave is suffering; Suffering for the sake of Christ through sacrifice for my fellow man. And it’s the one thing I’ve found myself least able to do recently. I am as cold and distant from humanity in general, and even the people I love in particular, as I have ever been at the most inhuman periods of my life. Even as a selfish three year-old, I was affected by my fellow’s tears.
My outer lack of productivity as of late is indicative of a lack of inner motion. There is no action where there is no will. And there is no will when there is no hope. It’s an easy thing to get beaten down by the world. And it’s an easy thing for a spirit like mine to enjoy the beating. My spiritual masochism will be the mud which chokes me in my own gloomy hell some day, I foresee.
posted by Sarie @
12:04 PM
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