Talking About Communication

Reconciliation with others is one of the hardest things to face.

Going into the confession booth requires some courage, but ultimately, this is a man who won't remember your faults the next day, and I personally leave with a sense of peace in my soul. However, admitting your faults to another person is difficult because they may throw something back in your face, or worse, gossip about the truth and vulnerability you offered.

When I started praying, I prayed for others' faults: please Lord, help this person overcome their rage and help this one stop cheating and guide this person back to You. Sure, I focused on my own faults, but I never forgot others'.

This is what God doesn't want from us. What's the biggest Bible verse people use as a weapon in arguments? "So when they continued asking [Jesus], he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her" (John 8:7). We can't shoot others down for their sins because no one on this world is perfect. God wants us to help each other grow, not berate each other.

Secondly, and this is a bit of a tangent, but the Bible is not to be used as a weapon. Its purpose it to teach the Word of God. If we use it argumentatively, non-believers will be turned away. If we use it as punishment, non-believers will be turned away. If we use it to highlight our goodness, non-believers will be turned away. We must reference the Bible to bridge gaps, not create them.

Returning to the main point, we must reconcile with those we hurt and those who hurt us. My confessors admit that this is not always possible, but we must, at the start, reconcile with them in our hearts. I have some people who I don't believe it would do any good to admit fault with them because they would use it to belittle me and my faith, but this is not my call. If God wills it, it must be done, but until then, there are others He is pulling me toward.

Communication is a two-way street. There are people I cannot face because of the harm they did me, but they believe it was justified, so there won't be reconciliation on their part. Or they don't think they did harm. Either way, it takes so much courage to step up to these people because we see them as enemies, not brothers and sisters.

But this communication and reconciliation may be what we need to be better Christians. I can learn something. They can learn something. We can treat people we meet in the future with more kindness and respect because of the words exchanged today. Personal growth is something not often strived for in this society, but it takes both desire and bravery to walk toward it.

My Lord, grant us the grace of courage to do Thy will. Grant us Your mercies. Thank You for the love, kindness, forgiveness, and hope bestowed on us each day. May You be praised throughout the world as the King of kings, Amen.

Prayer for Healing

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

My Lord, you are gracious.
Your love endures forever.
May you forgive us of our transgressions
and grant us the grace to forgive others of theirs.
I pray now, Lord, that you place in me
the desire to reconcile within my heart
and, when possible, to reconcile with others.
I ask that you only place in my mind
good thoughts of people who have hurt me
and that you bring peace and healing to those
whom I have hurt.
The actions we do intentionally
and the ones we do without thinking
all lead us to pain and heartache,
and I ask you, dear Father, to guide us, your children, back to you.
Stop our tongues from lashing out,
stop our hearts from holding hatred,
and stop our minds from imagining the worst.
Please heal us, my Father.
Please heal us.
We need your love, your forgiveness, and your ways.
I wish healing and peace to those against me,
and I am sorry for hurting them.
Please help me to remember that when I am hurt
to turn the other cheek.
Please help me to remember that when others ask impossible tasks of me
that I am not obligated to obey or please them
but to also not cause them harm for causing me distress.
My Lord, I am not perfect,
but neither are my enemies.
Please heal me and all those suffering today.
Your son died for our sins,
but I wish to sin no more, my Lord.
Envelope me in the Holy Spirit,
banish the devil from me,
and may you always be gentle with our heavy hearts.
In your great mercy, we pray.
Amen.

Mental Detachment

I spoke previously about detachment from things that lead us to do wrong or from people who hurt us or lead us down a bad road. However, while reading The Book of My Life by Teresa of Avila, I'm learning about the need for mental detachment.

Last year, I suffered a great blow to my reputation because of what one person said about me. What they said were lies, but even when they spoke the truth, they spoke with such contempt that people gave me dirty looks when they saw me. It was something I had never experienced before. Girls in high school weren't as mean as this person, but God saved me from continuing this experience and brought me out of it.

I thought this was the kind of detachment that saints and scholars spoke about, but like with everything spiritual, we try to make it physical so we can understand it. However, Teresa of Avila referred to the mental attachment we have to people, specifically their words about us.

Detachment from idols? Sure, add distance to the friends, parents, or loved one who we worship. Detachment from bad habits and people? Okay, let me walk away and seek solace elsewhere. But our minds? How do we stop taking what other people say about us as the last judgment?

Whether someone is attacking me or praising me, at the end of the day, their words mean nothing on my soul. God's opinion alone is what will alter my life. Even if what the person had said last year was true, it would not change the fact that others now view me poorly, but these opinions do not change who I am as a person unless I change because of it.

This mental detachment is difficult. How do we accept praise as a fleeting thought someone has about us and not build up our own image in our heads? I don't think this is merely a lack of humility, but a need for validation. Our society has taught us that what other people say, like, or share about us is what makes us the kind of person we are. However, my relatives or boss telling me how great I am doesn't do anything to aid my soul or my heart because the moment their view changes, even temporarily, will ruin my day.

Teresa of Avila explains this in depth and highlights the complex idea that we cannot worship multiple gods. We cannot expect to follow Christ and be in union with Him and also rely on approval of others to feed our hearts (248). Our worth comes from God. Our life comes from God. Any goodness we have comes from, yes, God.

Practicing detachment from validation is needed for any person regardless of their belief. Children and teens should be reminded that they are a valued human being becuase they live, not because they have two thousand followers or get the most attention online. Everything in this world is temporary because we take nothing with us when we die, including the words of others.

Dear Lord, may You instill in me a desire for You and You alone. May I not succumb to the pressures of this society and instead flourish in the Word and Your promises. I ask for peace in the hearts, minds, and souls of all people on this earth. To You be the glory and praise. Amen.

Authentically Me: Failure and High Expectations

My prayer and self goal for 2018 is to seek and welcome peace into my mind, heart, and soul in whatever form God wills. I returned to work on April 5th, exactly two months after my surgery, and it has done wonders on my anger and burdens. Getting out of the house is what I needed to see how my life could move forward. Unfortunately, I also see how much work is still left on me to do, and with the way society imposes expectations, it's difficult to pinpoint which pieces need the most work.

Failure vs. Lessons

I overuse the word 'failure.' All my former relationships are failures because they ended. My inability to overcome anger is a failure. Not working in the field I studied is a failure. But are they failures by God's standards or the world's?

The Lord focuses on lessons within the Bible to teach His people His ways. What we view as a failure, God wants to use as a lesson to better us and remind us that forgiveness and second chances are real. Society wants to emphasize failure and success so we can measure our worth, but how do you measure a young person's Bachelor's degree against another person's twenty years of industry experience? It doesn't equate.

One of the ways to overcome anger is to recognize that there is something I still need to learn. What am I overlooking about my last relationship so I can be prepared for the next one? What am I not noticing about single life that will help me become my whole self? What can this current work experience teach me that I can carry into the field I studied? Am I sincerely angry, or do I feel stuck, lost, or overwhelmed and don't know how to face these emotions?

If we fail, we lose our sense of self-worth. But when we learn from mistakes and treat everything as a teaching or growth moment, we realize how we can welcome the trials of this world to fortify us against bigger battles ahead.

New Milestones

Before I measured my worth by achievements: degrees, promotions, new cars, and buying a house. I'm slowly, very slowly, realizing that my inadequacy derives from these pointless achievements. I'm not considering education pointless in any way, but when we weigh the piece of paper more than we weigh the knowledge and experience, we have a problem.

I want to achieve happiness in this life, and these things gave me a sense of accomplishment but only when I could brag about them. Rather, I want to seek joy in talking about things that bring me joy: faith, books, video games, and superheroes. I want to achieve peace in my heart by getting out in my community and meeting new friends. I want to know I've reached the next point in my life not with a mortgage payment but with satisfaction each morning I wake up.

This road lasts a lifetime. There are days where I feel like I hate the world and in turn despise myself because I can't figure out why I fall back so easily. But God constantly brings me back to him, whether in prayer, confession, or through kind strangers. Peace is not an achievement; it is a state of being, and that state is shifting as often as we move.

My goal for this year is to welcome peace into my life, but my hope is to meet the authentic me and help her blossom.

My Lord, You are good. You are merciful. You are Our true Father. May we follow Your will for our lives, not only for Your sake, but for our own, so that we may become the people You intended us to be all along. In Jesus' name, Amen.

April 2018 Celebrations

April is a momentous month for me in my faith journey. I was baptized on April 5, 2015, and I received confirmation on April 15, 2017. If I can get my matrimony sacrament in April, that would be awesome.

I am not the same person I was when I sunk underwater, and I am not the same person I was when I tasted the Eucharist for the first time. However, it's difficult to feel like I'm still moving forward as a Christian when worldly problems bring me back to the old me and not the new me, the one formed in Christ.   

It's forever an uphill battle. I will never reach perfection, either in God or in the world. But while the world demands it, God wants my best, my tries, my attempts to be the version of me He intended. Sometimes I feel like I completely rolled myself back down the hill, but unlike before, I roll back to His feet, and He helps me up.

The last two months have taught me a lot about myself. I spent eight weeks on medical leave for my

surgery, and then I spent my first three days back at work on bereavement leave to attend my grandmother's memorial. Finally, my first two days back at work washed me in past hurt, hatred, and suffering that I spent my entire leave trying to overcome.

May the Lord keep me always. I feel as though I constantly fall short, but my priest has reminded me that not everything I do is bad or not enough. If my biological parents would hurt to hear the way I speak of myself as a failure, how much worse is it for God to hear it as my creator?

I was baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and I pledged myself to His one and only church. My next step is to keep studying, keep praying, and push myself to get more involved with my parish and community. This anger and self-hatred will not reign in my heart. My soul is freed because of His mercy and sacrifice. I will rise above because I will trust in the Lord.

Lord, instill trust and certainty in my life. May I find peace in my thoughts and actions, and may I cultivate peace around me. I have not pursued peace amongst others, my Lord, and I know that is wrong. Please help my anger to be vanquished. Please help me to forgive and forget. I don't want to be weighed down with desires that are not from You. I seek You now, Lord, to heal me and guide me in Your will.

May the Lord bless us in this month of His risen son. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.

Idolatry: Regret

Sometimes it's not enough to focus on your greatest internal sin when you're still not addressing the major issue. I thought my problem areas were anxiety about the future and anger about the past, but now I'm wondering if there is another stop in between. Right now, I strive to be a better servant for God, but it's difficult to do that when I'm living presently in regret and bitterness.

Regretting After the Fact

I don't tend to regret friendships while I'm out to dinner with friends. I don't tend to feel bitter toward co-workers while we're working as a team. I don't question interactions with others while I'm smiling with them. It's not until after someone make a mistake, usually an intention to hurt or an accidental betrayal that hurts just as much, that we regret ever trusting them.

I am not an exception. No one on this Earth is an exception to anything or anyone. However, when we feel this personal betrayal, it's easy to fire blame and take on revenge or erasure. Get even, or pretend they never existed at all: aren't these the best ways to let people know what they've done? Truthfully? No. Am I a hypocrite for saying that based on my past and current actions? Yes. Does it null the truth? Definitely not. 

We regret our past actions because we think we should have seen the red flags, we should have noticed the bad traits, we should have heard about their past interactions and gotten a clue. But none of that is necessarily true. Some individuals only reveal their true colors to their family, others their best friends. Some only online. But their actions cannot change the people we are. We cannot alter our ability to love, trust, and befriend one person based on the actions of others.

But in my case, it's getting harder to trust strangers because I'm waiting for them to hurt me like others have.

Going Back Out (And Trusting Again)

I went out last weekend, and I said something mean to someone who was once in my life because I couldn't imagine how he could ever realize the suffering he put me through. When I got home, I knew I needed to repent, but it took close to an hour before I felt any sense of peace with God because I felt so good at the thought that I had hurt someone.

This is wrong.

This is evil.

This elation is not from the Lord.

If I hurt someone, it doesn't clear their actions. It doesn't fix the pain I feel. It doesn't make me feel like a better person. I had to dig deep to find repentance because I was so entangled in the devil's temptations. I had to first ask God for the desire to be free of it and the strength to break it in order to feel the regret that I should have felt right away.

Some Christians have told me to not feel so much regret for my sins, but I think regret for sins is great if it leads you to your knees to ask forgiveness. The amount of your sinful regret is an indication of the kind of Christian you want to be for God. Not everyone is on the same page, and that's okay. If you feel bad for gossiping, then focus on only spreading positivity. Focus on what you feel are your greatest flaws as a good person, and improve yourself from there.

My weakness to bitterness is something I want to repair. I want to have strength to say no to temptation. I want to forgive more openly so that regret doesn't linger after a relationship ends. If it's possible to reconcile, I want to do that. If it's not, then I want to leave a person with a sense of peace and understanding between us. 

I make bad decisions. I hurt others. I'm not perfect, but I try to seek God. I try to pray more often. Do I repent as soon as I do something bad? No. Does God want me to? Yes. No Christian follows God's plans exactly, but there's a reason the Lord adored King David.

He wasn't perfect, but he loved the Lord with every fiber of his being, and God asks for nothing more than our love and desire for Him.

My Lord, I ask that You help myself and all others suffering from regret and bitterness. You love and forgive us, and so we should love and forgive others. Even more so, my Lord, may You help us to love and forgive ourselves. Remind us that we, too, are humans and make mistakes. O Lord, strengthen us and let us seek You and praise You for Your endless mercy, glory, and love. In Jesus' name, we pray to You. Amen.

Lil Bean Book Recs: March 2018

One of my lifestyle changes for 2018 was to always have a book on my nightstand and to read 30 minutes minimum daily. This month I wanted to delve more into St. Teresa of Avila, who I chose to be my patron saint at the time of my Confirmation.

15 Days of Prayer with St. Teresa of Avila

When I started reading Jean Abiven's 15 Days, I expected some excerpts from St. Teresa's published work as well as some recommendations to pray more often and with more intention. What I didn't expect was for every other chapter to hit me so hard I needed to put it down to reflect.

Abiven starts with the topic of the chapter, or day, then goes to pieces from St. Teresa's books, a deeper explanation of the importance of the topic in life and prayer, and finally with reflection questions about how your current prayer life is going. Abiven explains complex topics in simple ways: becoming humble, loving one another despite faults, finding peace within the soul, and practicing detachment. The result is a smack in the face.

At just 98 pages and approximately 6-7 pages of daily reading, it's not difficulty to fit time in to read this title and others like it. For me, seeking peace was just as difficult to swallow and take in as the chapters focusing on forgiveness and maturity. It made me question my relationship with others and how my prayer life is affected by the way I pray as much as how often I do.

Rather than focus on God cleaning my sins, I'm practicing how to ask for the graces of patience, forgiveness, serenity, and trust so that when I start leaving behind my temptations, my heart and soul will already fill its place with God's intentions before the temptation pulls me back down. I'm learning the importance of praying for all people, the ones I know and the ones I don't, in the hopes that they find their healing and growth. Most importantly, the more I pray, the more I'm pulled to good and kind acts of service rather than turning a blind eye.

There are multiple versions of 15 Days. I suggest finding someone who speaks to you in their life's actions and work and reading up on how their positive influence can encourage you to strive further for God's glory.

May God lead all of us toward Him, whether in prayer, community, or word. Bless us with strength and perseverance in all our endeavors. In Jesus' name, Amen.