A Healthy Case of Spiritual Materialism

Recently I feel like I've been hung up on trying to figure out how to put holiness into a box more than I ever have before in my life. And not only that, I have wanted to own it, like control it/own it, and possess it as if it were some physical object. And as it is a case of spiritual materialism, the subjects of the books I was purchasing without any real possibility of reading in the near future were contemplation, prayer, the catechism, happiness, faith and of the authorship of a priest well read and with a lot of experience in the topic. It was a real shopping spree - I must have bought a book every two weeks or so, not just online, but in actual stores, too. On top of that, while I would love the titles and ideas behind them, I really don't have time or energy to sit down and read all of these in such a way that would actually benefit me spiritually. I went on buying thinking that within one of these "holy" books I would be able to find a definitive idea or concept that I could just read and become enlightened as to realizing heaven on earth. The other problem was that I was trying to read a book on contemplation already but not actually practicing it at all - which is exactly what one needs to do in order to grow: spend time in prayer with God. In other words, I didn't want to change myself, but God to change for me and to accommodate to my need to put God in a box.

As I understand spiritual materialism, I think this is a good example. It was a feeling and perspective I received that lead me to think that I could find God in a book like that. I mean it would be easy to gain heaven: the physical world defines you and all you need to do is to acquire the right physical objects. I suppose that could lead to an hypothetical analysis of whether or not it would be easy to gain whatever objects they were, but that is not why I'm writing this post. Basically, what I want to say here is that in this state of me becoming a temporary spiritual materialist, I became more and more anxious about feeling like I had done enough for God and done the right things. And through this whole process of buying the books, it just so happened that one of the books would not fit through the mail slot in the door of the row home that I'm residing at for part of the week, and a slip was dropped off to notify me that it would be at the post office waiting for me. One of the days after that, I very quickly made a decision to try to pick up the book from the post office, though the office was closing at 5pm and it was already 4:45pm. Reflecting my own anxious mislead desire for holiness by owning the book on prayer and the desire to fulfill that desire I raced out of my work building and over to the post office, only to get there a minute or two after 5pm and walk up to ask the lady at the door if it was closed. Of course it was. Thus endeth the lesson... for now. It was a great help in revealing where my own desires lay. I was able to get that I didn't really have a good sense of what was necessary to achieve heaven in the here and now, but that I was way off and that the actions I was taking in order to express that misguided notion were only making my thirst for satisfaction and fulfillment worse.

Hopefully I can learn from this lesson and move on to a different way of approaching God and opening up to the Great Mystery that cannot be contained, even in a book on prayer or contemplation.

Everything I Want to Do Is a Sin... Don't Worry, Pun Intended

Big sigh. I'm an emotional fellow, what can I say? I am the middle child between two sisters, give me a break. But lately I've been stressed that I am not doing enough... in all areas of my life. Actually, it's more that I feel like I myself am never going to be worthy of satisfaction, and of rest from trying to be more than I am. The most satisfaction and contentment I feel is being with my fiance, family and close friends, nothing against any of those whom I love the most. It is a daily battle especially now that I am trying to live a dream that I had: teaching religion at the high school that I attended. But even when I'm with my fiance, my family, and close friends, I want to be even closer to them, to be even more than their friend, brother, son, and fiance. Even when I am most contented, I desire that much more happiness and fulfillment.

And so, I have come here to write and breathe as freely as possible, venting and grumbling, trying to make sense and find direction in my life. So, here goes: I just read the beginning of Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal: War Stories from the Local Food Front by Joel Salatin, and I am finding myself much more dissatisfied than I was before I had begun to read. I simply don't have a good grasp of reality, and finding out how strict legislation is, 7-8 years after the fact means that I am almost completely out of touch with how the world works and what is really going on in my life - at least with regards to where my food comes from. In college I got away with poorly reflecting on the current disintegration of the philosophical underpinnings of some industrialized-food systems and the more integrated underlying philosophy of fairly out-dated guidelines for monastic living. But now, I am trying harder to get more to the point: my own dissatisfaction with my day-to-day experience. I am not who I want to be for my fiance, family and friends. I want to fulfill them, and make them happy, but I can't. I want to be in constant community with them. I am trying to keep from being as dramatic as saying that I want eternal life, I want heaven now, but that's just it. I am so much of a product of my culture that I cannot help but feel the anxiety of instant gratification breathing down my neck to feel better about myself.

And now I am dissatisfied with my own blogging... who would have guessed? What a downer this is! I don't know why I do so much of this writing: do I write and think this way in order to give myself impetus to try harder, to motivate myself by anger at the injustice I am causing by not letting myself be loved properly by God, by my fiance, by my family, by my friends? Or, maybe that's even an oversimplification of the daily complications that help me to let go in the midst of confusion and frustration. It is a daily struggle for me at this point in my life not to beat myself up for failing to attain the loftiest dreams that I created in my imagination up to now: to be God (How ridiculous?! I know!). I can't remember at the moment how I got to that point.

Yesterday I was thinking that I am constantly seeking certainty about how I am fairing, always wanting to know that I am doing ok, to know that I am doing something good in my life or for someone of my place in the world. Inherently, that is backwards and mixed-up because I am seeking to compare myself to others, not accepting the mystery of the Future, a Future that is wrapped up in its own beyond-ness and other-ness. On a positive note, my mind drifts off to the words of a well-noted prayer of Fr. Louis, Thomas Merton:

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you and I hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing. And I know that if I do this, you will lead me by the right road although I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death, I will not fear, for you are ever with me and you will never leave me to face my

perils alone."

Somehow, to read someone else's experience of the uncertainty of the future, and to read them and take another perspective enables me to relax and ease back from being tense, always needing to be ready for anything so that I might be the first to pounce on that one opportunity of a lifetime... though I haven't the slightest clue what that might be or why I might have such an attitude. Hold up! I brake to a stop from riding the roller coaster that are my thoughts sometimes, about the adequacy of my life and my actions and my thoughts, and my words, and everything that I am. I just realized that it was this effort at trying to account completely for myself in the world, in anticipation of giving a full account of myself to my creator at the end of my days, that I came to write. Bound still by my own narcissism and self-centeredness, I realize a little bit more of my enslavement. I am not God, and delight in being the particular, the limited, the bound being that I am. I am grateful for my disintegration that I can be held by You, Integrity Entire and Final, that I can be with others who are like me and rest in their company. One hour of hard work here I come!

Goal for the next post: Be specific about reflecting on a real world experience.