My desire to watch the programs we like together isn't working. You just watch what you want when you want to, leaving me no opportunity to either share in them with you or to catch up on them (because you're always watching something else).
Needing a new approach - not for the television; I don't care about the programs. For us.
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
Another way of looking at it:
Steve Smith posted his first multi-TD game since Cam Newton's debut (2011). Smith has as many multi-TD games with Joe Flacco as he had in three years with Newton. - ESPN NFL Power Rankings, week 5
Or: it took Smith four times as many games to get his first multi-TD game with Flacco as it took with Newton. As it happens, I think Flacco is the better QB, but still.
Or: it took Smith four times as many games to get his first multi-TD game with Flacco as it took with Newton. As it happens, I think Flacco is the better QB, but still.
More on humility
If you are humble nothing will touch you, neither praise nor disgrace, because you know what you are. - Mother Teresa, as quoted on my Facebook timeline
I suppose it is also not humble to be afraid of what I am.
I suppose it is also not humble to be afraid of what I am.
Listening: Step one, session two
At that time Jesus declared, "I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yea, Father, for such was thy gracious will. All things have been delivered to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
"Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." - Mt 11, 25-30
It is no accident that both Jesuits and Benedictines start their journeys with an emphasis on listening to God with the heart:
L I S T E N carefully, my child, to your master's precepts, and incline the ear of your heart. - Prov 4, 20, as quoted at the beginning of the Prologue of the Rule of St. Benedict
This session starts with a reminder of how misplaced my spiritual pride has been. (I have a feeling that this journey is going to be another painful one, as growth so often is. I suppose that's the chief reason we so rarely grow.) But there is no room for this underlying tendency I have had to take affirmation from my ability to "get it," whatever the latest "it" is. I pray that it will not take a humiliation (in the traditional sense of the word) for me to receive the humility to which God is calling me. No one can know anything except by the grace of God, and I am certainly not the shining exception to that truth.
I have always viewed this passage as a bit of a non sequitur, But for me, now, this second paragraph flows from the first. My challenge is to trust in God rather than trust in me and attribute it to God. The latter is my modus operandi; after all, I'm pretty good at figuring out what I need and what I need to do. But this approach keeps me perpetually in the middle of a war between my own will and what I know to be God's. There's nothing easy about that yoke!
So I am hoping that this first journey through these Exercises will help break my prideful insistence on self-dependency and my need for the approval of others, and will replace them with a gentle, restful trust in God.
"Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." - Mt 11, 25-30
It is no accident that both Jesuits and Benedictines start their journeys with an emphasis on listening to God with the heart:
L I S T E N carefully, my child, to your master's precepts, and incline the ear of your heart. - Prov 4, 20, as quoted at the beginning of the Prologue of the Rule of St. Benedict
This session starts with a reminder of how misplaced my spiritual pride has been. (I have a feeling that this journey is going to be another painful one, as growth so often is. I suppose that's the chief reason we so rarely grow.) But there is no room for this underlying tendency I have had to take affirmation from my ability to "get it," whatever the latest "it" is. I pray that it will not take a humiliation (in the traditional sense of the word) for me to receive the humility to which God is calling me. No one can know anything except by the grace of God, and I am certainly not the shining exception to that truth.
I have always viewed this passage as a bit of a non sequitur, But for me, now, this second paragraph flows from the first. My challenge is to trust in God rather than trust in me and attribute it to God. The latter is my modus operandi; after all, I'm pretty good at figuring out what I need and what I need to do. But this approach keeps me perpetually in the middle of a war between my own will and what I know to be God's. There's nothing easy about that yoke!
So I am hoping that this first journey through these Exercises will help break my prideful insistence on self-dependency and my need for the approval of others, and will replace them with a gentle, restful trust in God.
Monday, September 29, 2014
Exercises - the first step, session one
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and return not thither but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and prosper in the thing for which I sent it. "For you shall go out in joy, and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands." Is 55, 10-12
They had better, for I often find that I cannot.
But that is the purpose of embarking upon this retreat. My participation in my prayer life has too long been a matter of how I feel rather than simply waiting faithfully upon God. I am more than my feelings, whatever they may be. And I am more than my tendency to engage in pride, to impress with my insight.
Even my blogging can be that, though this is now for me just a place where I can retrace my steps along these exercises. If I should borrow Miss Manners' term - Gentle Reader - I must first associate these words with myself, for whom they have often been not terribly accurate.
Lord, allow your word to water me, to make this dry seed bring forth and sprout. Let my entire soul join the mountains and the hills in song, and the trees in claps of rhythm and praise to your glory.
They had better, for I often find that I cannot.
But that is the purpose of embarking upon this retreat. My participation in my prayer life has too long been a matter of how I feel rather than simply waiting faithfully upon God. I am more than my feelings, whatever they may be. And I am more than my tendency to engage in pride, to impress with my insight.
Even my blogging can be that, though this is now for me just a place where I can retrace my steps along these exercises. If I should borrow Miss Manners' term - Gentle Reader - I must first associate these words with myself, for whom they have often been not terribly accurate.
Lord, allow your word to water me, to make this dry seed bring forth and sprout. Let my entire soul join the mountains and the hills in song, and the trees in claps of rhythm and praise to your glory.
Rooting it out
Take, O Lord, and receive my entire liberty, my memory, my understanding and my whole will. All that I am and all that I possess You have given me: I surrender it all to You to be disposed of according to Your will. Give me only Your love and Your grace; with these I will be rich enough, and will desire nothing more. Amen. - St. Ignatius of Loyola
It is time to allow God to root out this dissatisfaction that I have welcomed as a long-term companion.
I am afraid of falling short, but I plan to begin the Spiritual Exercises this evening.
But as it happens, this may be the perfect time in my life for them. In the past, I think I would have felt as if this was something I was doing (i.e. of myself) rather than something God is doing in me.
It is time to allow God to root out this dissatisfaction that I have welcomed as a long-term companion.
I am afraid of falling short, but I plan to begin the Spiritual Exercises this evening.
But as it happens, this may be the perfect time in my life for them. In the past, I think I would have felt as if this was something I was doing (i.e. of myself) rather than something God is doing in me.
Today's words
fainéant \fay-nay-AHN\ - idle and ineffectual : indolent
I doubt I'll ever use this word. I just hope I can recall it if I ever see it in use.Götterdämmerung \gher-ter-DEM-uh-roong\ - a collapse (as of a society or regime) marked by catastrophic violence and disorder; broadly : downfall
I knew the meaning, in a general sense, thanks to Wagner, but I had the pronunciation wrong. Also, the first part of the etymology was obvious, but I hadn't an inkling of the the second part.chuckwalla \ˈchək-ˌwä-lə\ - a large herbivorous lizard (Sauromalus obesus) of the iguana family of desert regions of the southwestern United States
I have stopped redoing pronunciations for consistency when some come from the WOTD (such as the first two of this post) and others from the general www.m-w.com site word lookup, such as this one from today's Dictionary Devil puzzle. I might have heard this word and had a sense that it is an animal, but definitely wasn't picturing a lizard.
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