Happy New Year! Happy New Struggle! Know How to Master Yourself

Let me reproduce to you an amusing story I read in Funlok:

Long ago in a small, far away village, there was a place known as the House of 1000 Mirrors. A happy little dog learned of this place and decided to visit. When he arrived, he bounced happily up the stairs to the doorway of the house. He looked through the doorway with his ears lifted high and his tail wagging as fast as it could. To his great surprise, he found himself staring at 1000 other happy little dogs with their tails wagging just as fast as his. He smiled a great smile, and was answered with 1000 great smiles just as warm and friendly. As he left the House, he thought to himself, "This is a wonderful place. I will come back and visit it often." In this same village, another little dog, who was not quite as happy as the first one, decided to visit the house. He slowly climbed the stairs and hung his head low as he looked into the door. When he saw the 1000 unfriendly looking dogs staring back at him, he growled at them and was horrified to see 1000 little dogs growling back at him. As he left, he thought to himself. That is a horrible place and I will never go back there again. All the faces in the world are mirrors. What kind of reflections do you see in the faces of the people you meet? And what kind of reflection does people see in your face? Well, this is what LIFE is all about. It gives you back everything you say or do. It is not karma. Our life is simply a reflection of our actions. Whatever you want to receive, give it first and you will receive it. If you want more love in your family, in your office, in your community, in your country, in the world, create more love in your heart. If you want your staff to be competent, improve your competence. This association applies to everything, in all aspects of life; Life will give you back everything you have given to it. Your life is not a coincidence.  It is a reflection of you!

Many times, we have good desires but we fail to translate these good desires into action. Other times, we seek to avoid specific lapses: unjustified delays, anger, impatience, uncharitable comments, envy, lack of care in guarding our senses, unnecessary expenses, outbursts, lack of order, lack of persistence, etc. And it seems as if our will did not have full dominion over our self. This difficulty to act in accord with God’s will and in accord with the good known by right reason, which reveals the remains of original sin in us, is only overcome by supernatural grace and the practice of the human virtues.

We need to learn how to govern ourselves. To do this , we need to direct everything in us, our mind, will and heart, all our senses and tendencies, to the pursuit of and identification with God’s will. Our self-mastery is aimed firstly at being able to center our life on God’s love, enabling us to be contemplatives in the middle of the world. Self-mastery comes when we let God take control of us, our desires, our ambitions and interests. To be a contemplative is to allow God to take possession of ourselves, in effect we get to rule ourselves because God rules us. What comes to your mind when you think of an "Unbridled" horse?. Wild? Untamed? Uncontrolled? Free? That's what I used to think, but the truth is that there are two kinds of "unbridled" horses. One is wild and uncontrolled and refuses to be bridled and the other no longer requires a bridle. The first horse tries to control it's life by refusing boundaries, rejecting relationship for selfish needs and refusing any limits–even if those limits are there to protect it and give it freedom The beginning of Unbridled freedom begins in a place where the small still voice of the master can be heard, and the experience of His rest can be found. The round pen is where this happens. In the safety of the round pen a trusting relationship between horse and trainer begins. The round pen is the place where loving correction and training take place. It is through the loving correction of the trainer that the horse is set free to be all it was created to be. As the horse learns to trust in the trainer and not in himself, he becomes more self controlled and more powerful, better able to serve the needs of the trainer and others it has been created to serve. God wants us to trust him in all our ways for He is our good and faithful master and He desires to give us understanding so that we may live the life of freedom and joy He has for us. Just like the horses, in a manner of speaking, we too have been placed in a round pen. As a horse trainer selects a horse and place him in the round pen, God has chosen us and placed us in this world. Just as the horse did not choose to be put in the round pen, we did not choose to be born, to be in the family where we are now. Both ourselves and the horse were selected, set apart, to be used for the masters purpose - to be set free from the bondage of our own limited understanding and given the mind of the master. In John 15:5 Jesus lays out the way things work in the round pen. he said " I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing." That's the way it works. If the horse knew more than the trainer, he would be the master. These awesome creatures were created to do great things - just as we were. But apart from the loving hand of the master, they can't do much more than eat, poop and run away from everything. That sounds a whole lot like our life apart from Christ. We have to be thankful that God has chosen us to be set apart from the herd. Sometimes though we must admit, it doesn't always seem like much fun in the round pen. Why was I put in this family, in this workplace, in this community, in this country? Why is my professional work not as exciting? Why can’t I not be allowed to have this or that? But it is what occurs in the round pens of our lives that sets us free to enjoy all that God has for us.

To give ourselves to God and the others, we need to be masters of ourselves. No one can give what he does not own. No one can give himself if he does not first possess himself, if he does not grow in the virtues and free himself from the slavery of sin. Self-mastery requires a solid, mortified life and the determination to separate from oneself whatever separates us from God. This brings us true happiness. The demands in our life are not onerous duties. Our life is a life of love that sees in renunciation something positive, i.e., it is a way of moving towards our life’s real goal: union with God and happiness on earth in his service. In short, we need to govern our emotions, our passions. Listen to the words of St. Josemaria: The alternative is clear: either man governs his passions and finds peace, or he lets himself be dominated by them and becomes unhappy. The starting point to self-mastery is self-knowledge. Knowing oneself well is the first and most important step to become the master of one’s life, to govern our sentiments. We need to discern what we feel. Is it anger? Is it sadness? Is it guilt? Is it shame? Then, let us ponder on what caused it, so that we can take steps to overcome negative emotions or foster positive ones. Let us not be hijacked by our feelings. To facilitate self-knowledge, it is useful to analyze the multiple elements that occur in our life: in our profession, relationships, health, studies, age, etc. Problems in one area can affect the whole person. We may have the tendency to project our sentiments on others. Or to expect solutions from others. It often happens that we neither totally nor partially – own responsibility in the state of affairs. Ownership is an important principle. For example, you see people littering on the streets. After eating corn, they throw them away just there. The men, after enjoying their cigarettes, they throw the butts on the street. Do they do that in their homes? No. Because they own their homes.

We have said earlier that the first step to self-mastery is self-knowledge. After knowing, own the sentiment and express it. How? Some people find this easier than others, i.e., they ‘vent’ – unburdening oneself of a troublesome thought to eliminate unpleasant emotions by talking about them. We do this in spiritual direction. I do this every week. Thanks be to God, someone patiently listens to my woes! Then, we need to be docile in order to let ourselves be guided by those who can help us. In spiritual direction they view our situation dispassionately, with objectivity and affection, and with the supernatural light that comes from weighing things in prayer. Therefore, there is no reason, outside of our pride, not to accept their guidance or to think we are right and they are mistaken. With self-knowledge and spiritual direction, we will detect the moments when it is harder for us to master ourselves, and we will employ the necessary means. For example, a person who knows she tends to respond brusquely during the first hours of the day will make a special effort not to wound others. One who sees that tiredness at the end of the day leads her to be less available will strive not to refuse, with bad manners and hurried excuses, to do someone a favor. The one who is aware that she easily loses her serenity when a certain topic of conversation comes up will be on guard not to interject rash words: you have to learn to disagree charitably with others – whenever the need arises-without becoming unpleasant (Furrow, no. 429).

Evaluate and reflect on your sentiments. This is the reality check. When people think of the word “reflection”, they typically think first of a mirror. After all, we use it as a part of our normal morning routine. We walk to the bathroom and look at ourselves in the mirror. We do that, out of habit, to see “how we look” and to help us improve our appearance for the day ahead. Mirrors are useful tools in our day. In a short amount of reflection time we get information about ourselves that helps us have a more successful and enjoyable day. Most of us would miss having a mirror around, and some perhaps wouldn’t think they could live without one. It puzzles me that while we use the power of reflection with a mirror as our tool; too few of us, far too infrequently use the greater powers that reflection can bring to our lives for much greater good. In other words we use a mirror to improve our outward appearance, but do not use the reflection tools that will improve us from the inside – in our minds and behaviors. As professional and individuals who want to make a difference, reach our goals, achieve more, to in fact, unleash our potential, we need to be continuous learners. And to be the most effective continuous learners, we must learn to harness the power of reflection. Reflection is a process of systematically thinking, and perhaps writing about what happened, with the goal of transforming the experience into knowledge that can be used in all sorts of future situations. In its simplest form, reflecting is just thinking about what happened. Reflection doesn’t mean looking for blame or looking for regrets. It will be most valuable when it is an observation of events and their results. In general, your reflection will be most valuable to you when you think about and answer these types of questions:

• What happened (both the process and the end results)?

• How did I feel about it?

• Why did it happen that way (what contributed to the results)?

• How does this remind me of other situations?

• What will I now do differently in the future?

These questions form the backbone of effective reflective learning. They help us look at the events and results from a variety of angles, but lead us to the most important question, “Knowing what I now know, what will I do differently?” Let me tell you another story I heard from Bo Sanchez. Three construction workers were on top of their half-finished skyscraper. Rrrrring!! The lunch bell sounded, and the three men sat on a steel beam jutting out of the 56th floor with their lunch boxes in hand.The first guy opens his and groans in exasperation, "Tuyo! There is not a day that I don't get tuyo for lunch!" He turns to his buddies and announces, "Mark my words, if I still get tuyo tomorrow, I'm going to throw myself from this building!"The second guy opens his lunch box and moans, "Tinapa... Everyday, I get tinapa!" He looks at his friends and declares, "Believe me when I say this:If I get tinapa tomorrow, I'm going to jump and kill myself!" The third guy opens his lunch box and it was his turn to despair. "Galunggong! All I get is galunggong! I'm telling you, if I still get galunggong tomorrow, I'm going to jump from this building and die!" The next day, the lunch bell rings and all three men are again seated on the56th floor. The first guy opens his lunch box and starts crying,"Tuyoooooo!" And so he jumps and crashes on the ground.The second guy opens his lunch box and wails loudly, "Tinapaaaa!" And he also hurls himself off the building and dies.The third guy opens his lunch box and screams, "Galunggonggggg! " And so, he too jumps off the building and splatters on the ground. Days later, during the funeral of the three men, their three wives embrace and weep together. The first wife cries out, "I didn't know my husband didn't like tuyo anymore! Why didn't he tell me? If only he told me, I would have prepared something else."The second wife echoes her statement, "Yes... If only I knew, I would have cooked something else, not tinapa!" The third wife, between sobs, speaks up, "I don't know why my husband killed himself..." The two wives looked at her curiously. "Why?" She went on, "Because my husband prepares his own lunch everyday..." I love this crazy story because it presents a very important truth: all of us prepare our own lunch. If we don't like our jobs, if we don't like the state of our relationships, if we don't like what's happening to our spiritual lives - we have no one to blame but ourselves. Because God has given us free will. He has given us the power to prepare our own lunch. If you want to earn more and be free from debt, if you're sick and tired of your bad habits, if we want to put more joy in our work, if we want to grow in our relationship with God - then go back to your kitchen and prepare yourself another dish. Because you design your own future. You create your own destiny. Ask yourself what kind of future do you want to have? What kind of life? What kind of eternity? You decide. Decide to work on essential points in your struggle. Whatever stage you are in your life now, test what I told you today. Self-mastery is all about self-giving. It starts with self-knowledge, own your sentiments and express them, ventilating them in spiritual direction and reflect on them to be able to know what course of action to take. As you do this everyday, you’ll notice an improvement.

Think about the muscles in your body and how you go about exercising them. For example you chose swimming as your exercise because in swimming, you move all your body parts. Suppose the last time you swam was 10 years ago. Now, you decided to swim and make 20 laps. There’s no doubt about it, you’re going to fail. It’s just too much for you. You can’t start off doing 20! You have to start off with a no. you can manage, something that you’re able and capable of doing, then gradually adding more and more to strengthen the muscles in your arms and feet. So how does that relate to self-mastery? Swimming or any exercise for that matter teaches us that you can’t do it all at once and this applies to self-mastery in other areas of your life. You can’t change everything all at once. If self-mastery is like a muscle then you must work on it like you would work on a muscle. You must strengthen that self-mastery muscle by starting off with small and easy things and then gradually work your way up. So how do you do this? Since it is the beginning of the year, I suggest you look at your life and determine what needs to change. Make a list of all the changes you would like to make. Then take one thing and focus on it. Work on it for a week or two until it becomes easy for you. Then begin the next thing. Gradually strengthen your self-mastery muscle one change at a time. So in summary, the message for today is that self-mastery is like a muscle which needs to be exercised in a gradual, progressive way.  Examine your life, determine what you want to change, and then work on one thing at a time. Master yourself so that you can master your life.

Are You Wealthy?

One day, I was reading an article and I came across Madame Imelda’s theory on wealth: “my economic theory is that money was made round to go round.  Money was made to encircle man so that he would blossom with many flowers.  The whole trouble is, the center is money.  All the heads of people thinking about money.  All the hands of people reaching out for money.  All their poor little bodies working for money.  They are running, in all directions for money.” Research shows that craving material possessions can cause depression and anger (cf. Business World, 4-VII-01).  Material possession may give a person a sense of control through owning something, but research shows that materialism is negatively correlated with life satisfaction. (cf. Shaun Saunders, one of the authors of the report from the University of Newcastle, Australia).  "Money can't buy you love." One source of depression among dedicated consumers was the fact that the property they acquired tended to lose value quickly. If your self-worth is invested in what you own, as can be the case in our market-driven society, then these things may not hold their value for very long. In the first encyclical of Pope John Paul II, Redemptoris Hominis (Redeemer of Humankind), he set out the following propositions, among others: materialism is the enslavement of the spirit.  Are you wealthy?  If yes, then be careful not to be attached to your wealth.  How does one knows if he is detached from his wealth and possessions?

 

Poverty is the virtue that facilitates having  a  heart for  God.   We need a free heart so that God can occupy  or  take over our whole heart. We need to live poverty because we want to imitate  Christ: poorer than a beggar. We want to be alter Christus, ipse Christus: another Christ or better yet, Christ Himself.   Our Lord gave  up  every­thing. He is the example of detachment and generosity. Jesus Christ, because he is God, was in need of nothing; but by becoming man he voluntarily despoiled himself of the splendor of his divinity and lived on earth as a poor man - from his birth in poverty in Bethlehem to his death on the cross; sometimes he did not even have the bare necessities of life. He could have chosen to be born in a palace but He  chose to  be born in a stable. And when He was dying on the Cross,  He had  nowhere to lay his head. 

To be ipse Christus, we have to imitate how Christ lived poverty.  The bonus odor Christi comes from poverty. Poverty is enriching. St John Chrysostom comments: "if you do not believe that poverty is enriching, picture your Lord and you will doubt me no longer. For had he not become poor, you could not have become rich. By a miracle which men cannot understand, poverty has produced these riches - the knowledge of God and godliness, liberation from sin, justification, sanctification, the countless good things which he has bestowed on us and will bestow on us in the future. All those things have accrued to us through his poverty - through his taking our flesh and becoming man and suffering what he suffered. And yet, unlike us, he did not deserve punishment and suffering." So, we have  to keep  alive  in us the life of our Lord. We should always be ready to leave everything in order to follow Jesus Christ. We have to check that the things that attract us, the things that we use, something of our own character, etc. are converted into a treasure  and we put our heart there. For all the souls to   fit into  our  heart,  we have to exert effort that it be empty  of material things.

In a book about the Blessed John Paul the Great  that I have read some years ago, there is a portion there that talks about his philosophy on what he calls the Law of the Gift: that we, men are continually struggling to be the persons that we are to the persons we ought to be. And that struggle can only be resolved by self-giving. The Pope said that it is in God the Holy Trinity, a "community" of self-giving "persons" who lose nothing of their uniqueness in their radical self-giving, that we see confirmed the Law of the Gift and the truth about freedom as freedom-for-self-donation. It is rather heavy but a good food for thought. The spirit of poverty and detachment from wealth is purely self-giving.

Since we began with a theory of wealth, we will also end with another theory on wealth.  I found this prayer of self-dedication to Jesus Christ  in the Daily Roman Missal: Lord Jesus Christ, take all my freedom, my memory, my understanding, and my will.  All that I have and cherish you have given me.  I surrender it all to be guided by your will.  Your grace and your love are wealth enough for me.  Give me these, Lord Jesus, and I ask for nothing more.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

We were born to live but Christ our Lord was born to die in order to redeem us.  A light of hope has dawned on us for "God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten son " to save us from eternal damnation.  Let us fathom the true meaning of Christmas: the total self-giving of Jesus, born in a manger in that little town of Bethlehem.  Only if we give ourselves will we find life with a capital "L".  The acceptance of God's Word made flesh will enable us all, in spite of the sufferings and tribulations our fellow Filipinos encountered in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan, to make our Christmas MERRY!  

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A FRUITFUL NEW YEAR TO ALL!

Are You Happy?

One day, I was browsing the internet and I read this story about Michael written by his friend.  Michael is the kind of guy who is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, would reply, "If I were any better, I would be twins!" He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, Michael was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.
Seeing this style really Michael’s friend curious, so one day he went up to Michael and  asked him, "I don't get it! You can't be a positive person all of the time.  How do   you do it?"

Michael replied,

"Each morning I wake up and say to myself, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or ... you can choose to be  in a bad mood. I choose to be in a good mood. Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or ... I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or... I can point out the positive side of life.  I Choose the positive side of life."
"Yeah, right, it's not that easy," his friend protested.

"Yes, it is," Michael said. "Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a   choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people affect   your mood. You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you live your life."

The friend reflected on what Michael said. Soon thereafter, they lost touch, but the friend often thought about Michael when he  made a choice about life instead of reacting to it. Several years later, he heard that Michael was involved in a serious accident,   falling some 60 feet from a communications tower. After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, Michael was released from the hospital with rods placed in his back. He saw Michael about six months after the accident. When he asked him how he was, he replied: "If I were any better, I'd be twins. Wanna see my scars?"

He declined to see his wounds, but he did ask him what had gone through his mind  as the accident took place.
"The first thing that went through my mind was the well-being of my soon-to-be-born daughter," Michael replied. "Then, as I lay on the ground, I remembered   that I had two choices: I could choose to live or ... I could choose to die.   I chose to  live."
"Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?" he asked. Michael continued,

"...the paramedics were great. They kept telling me I was going   to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the ER and I saw the expressions on   the  faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really scared. In their eyes, I read  "he's a dead  man. I knew I needed to take action."

"What did you do?" he asked.
"Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me," said Michael. "She  asked if I was allergic to anything.  'Yes', I replied. The doctors and  nurses stopped  working as they waited for my reply. I took a deep breath and yelled,  'Gravity.' "
Over their laughter, I told them,

"I am choosing to live. Operate on me as if  I am alive,  not dead."

Michael lived, thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his amazing  attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice to live fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.  

"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow  will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." After all  today is the  tomorrow you worried about yesterday.

I came out a transformed person upon reading this article.  I said to myself:  Do you want to be happy?  It is your choice! 

Last Saturday, my nephew Lance and I were playing “Tic, Tac, Toe” on the Ipad of my sister.  Lance is six years old and he is a champion.  Why?  Because he does not want to lose a game.  If he loses, he will start crying and you will become an enemy to him.  So the game started and I was winning and so Lance took over my slot in order to win the game.  However, even as he took over my moves, I still managed to steal a move and I won the game.  As expected, Lance started to cry and he sat beside my leg and slightly hitting it with his tiny hand.  Several times, he did this and I told him, “Lance, do you want to be a bad boy or a good boy?  It is your choice!”   I repeated this three times.  He stopped beating my leg and I sensed he was thinking about the question and slowly... slowly... he stood up and kissed me!  What a joy to see a six-year old boy choosing to be HAPPY!

Cheerfulness, fruit of the theological virtues

I want you to be happy always, for cheerfulness is an essential part of your way (The Way, 665).  Our cheerfulness doesn’t depend on circumstances.  It is not the kind we might call physiological good spirits – the happiness of a healthy animal.  You must seek something more: the supernatural happiness that comes from the abandonment of everything and the abandonment of yourself into the loving arms of our Father-God (The Way, 659).  That is why you find so many people who from a human point of view ought to be ever so happy, yet they go about uneasy and embittered.  They appear to be overflowing with happiness, but just scratch beneath the surface of their souls and you will discover a bitterness more bitter than gall (Friends of God, 12).

“Cheerfulness is not a different virtue to charity, but rather a certain act and effect of charity” (S. Th. II-II, q. 28, a. 4).  The command to be cheerful is as all-encompassing as the commandment to love God.  Cheerfulness also flows from the other two theological virtues.  Live cheerfully in your hope (Rom 12:12).  Your optimism will be a necessary consequence of your faith (The Way, 662). Consequently, to be happy we have to awaken the theological virtues through a life of prayer and the reception of the sacraments of confession and the Holy Eucharist most especially during this Christmas season.

Cheerfulness is the “engine oil” that makes human interaction run smoothly; thus it is especially important at home and at work.  A cheerful attitude helps us to be positive and understanding towards the defects and errors of one’s spouse, children, and colleagues.  A sense of humour puts setbacks in perspective: they are our daily bread.

Mother Theresa of Calcutta may have won the exalted Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, but she nevertheless came up with advice which was disconcerting in its simplicity.  Once some American professors asked her, “Please tell us something to help us in our lives.”  Mother just said, “Smile.  I’m completely serious.”