So I've been having this wonderful Lent: prayerful, uplifting, transforming. It's been a wonderful confluence of unmerited favor, a combination of the opportunity to prayerfully reflect on the Way of the Cross each week along with the grace to pray and read reflectively each morning, even when I haven't especially felt like doing so or have wanted to go in another direction with my attention.
Then, last weekend, I hit a bit of a roadblock, a glitch in a relationship that immediately evoked my former tendencies to put all of my attention on myself and what I wanted. That's actually a far more complex thing, and I don't want to get into the details of it right now.
But a funny thing happened to me this time. Instead of just hardening my heart so as to go my own stubborn way, I found the grace and mercy - not within me toward another, but toward me from God - to keep on track. I persevered in daily prayer and reflection, embracing and trusting what I believe to be God's desire for me rather than my former self-centeredness. And, lo and behold, an opportunity to mend that bruised relationship arose, which I'd have ignored or avoided or just been oblivious to had I been engrossed in my selfish pique. Now my emotions and relationships are back in harmony, and the typical downward spiral has been checked.
A spiritual reflection on this will follow later . . .
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