Tuesday 18 December 2012

#246 Balancing Service with Quality Personal Growth Time


     “becoming a superior person sometimes requires more discipline than even the best of us can muster. For one thing, the vita mixta requires equal attention to both action and contemplation. Augustine’s ‘righteous busyness’ must be founded upon times of ‘holy quiet.’ Without replenishing ourselves with solitude, we will find that our busyness – all our doing and giving and caring – leaves us only frustrated, resentful, and exhausted. ‘It is so easy to simply get too busy to grow,’ writes the Benedictine monastic Joan Chittister. ‘It is so easy to commit ourselves to this century’s demand for product and action until the product consumes us and the actions exhaust us and we can no longer even remember why we set out to do them in the first place.’ Worse, without holy quiet, righteous busyness easily becomes self-righteous. We’ve all caught ourselves at times when our efforts to do good in the world – to teach our children, help our communities, correct an injustice – have more to do with looking good or proving something than with a genuine, selfless desire to serve.”

       Simmons P. Learning to fall. The blessings of an imperfect life. Bantam Books, NY, 2000.

Legend of the Fish People at the Great Flood by Norval Morisseau



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