STEP X- Down and Out (Limited Goodness)

We feel delighted when consolation comes, and we likely treated ourselves as a superhero, who was able to accomplish something great. “I deserve this”!” I am good enough for this”! We are so enthusiastic to show others that we are so.
But, when things turn out to be not the way we would have them to be, we start to point out something defective in those people around us. Or, sometimes, we begin to blame other people, and even God. “Why did it happen to me?” “I don’t deserve it!”
There seems to be no question of our human frailty. Once we proved ourselves good and great, we tend to forget that we are still on the ground of humanity, with such vulnerability. It is almost impossible for us to believe that we are this and that. Once we already put up an image of ourselves (superego) as ‘somebody’ and not somebody else in the eyes of other people.
It really found me unbelieving to hear my colleague telling me something about my attitude in the ward, after some couple of years we worked together as nurses in a government hospital. At first, it was really repugnant to me. I can’t really imagine that I was. Honestly, I just felt nothing but to prove him wrong and I cannot really remember any situation that I acted out as such I explained. I cannot accept it at all, because what I knew of myself was never that kind.
I seem to know myself very closely. Yet, I continue to deny the idea. Then, I started to struggle inside. “Cris could never be that kind certainly!” Then I feel dismayed.
Several visits had always found me uncomfortable. I just cannot understand why. Was it because I cannot accept that I was once, as what I have heard about me?
It took me to own the feelings of accepting it as true. It was not actually far from being true. Now, I’ve just seen in myself that I have at least the tendency to react in such a way. I had to recollect myself and had to learn to pick up those pieces which I found myself was losing to that end. Yes I am not a saint. In fact, I was not really good at all, I realized. Then, it maybe true! I rest consoled.
Christian love story is such a sweet sounding story that could ever be told. Yet, it could also appear as such as an untold story that remains in the realm of wonders. It must be a high-tide encounter. A kind of an elating experience!
We received, then, in return we also give… We are able to give, because we have received and received it first… It is the down and out of our story.
But, in another way, more than the previous one, the down and out-ness of our Christian love story is even more meaningful in the way Jesus had shown to us. Not only in giving a life that is full, but also of dying in emptiness, to bring life anew in the fullness of grace. God’s love come down to us, and we empty out ourselves to others that they may have life. Yet, we cannot totally share when we keep something reserved. God wanted us to empty out ourselves for others, that is, denying ourselves of ourselves, then, we are free to love even more- not of our own initiative and strength, but God’s.
All the while, we thought that we are truly loving, when we are able to touch other people’s lives to our own satisfaction. We feel some kind of being flattered for doing good and pleasing God. But, such experience ends up right here and there. Feeling of disappointment is somehow placed down underneath. But, once it surfaces up, everything seems to shudder down. Then, we realize that we are not really good… We feel down… Imprisoned in our old self again, we are not free at all. It is miserable we may say.
We are just putting up a block on this reality that we choose to be blinded by the false image of ourselves. We fail to bring our true selves because we dwell on making up something that is not of us.
To make up for something that is not naturally ours, is an act of denying ourselves, in such a way, we cannot accept ourselves. Hence, we cannot really know ourselves. It is only in accepting ourselves; totally recognizing our naturalness, embracing our natural limitations and tendencies, bearing our defects, letting go of our pains and concerns, which only then, we become empty for God’s grace to fill in. Yet, we are not ready to face our poverty, because, we feel that we are full- full enough for others. But, we don’t actually share our life with others, because we are more centered on ourselves rather than others. We seek consolation instead of consoling others.
It is only when we experience our poverty that we are able to encounter our faith journey with God. God wants us to be totally free, empty, before He can come into our hearts. He can’t work in us, unless we are ready to accept Him in full freedom of loving. It should always remind us, that to love Him, is not always to feel inspired and consoled. To love Him also entails for us, to be confronted with the real Jesus, who also exact and even reprimand His friends, for them to be totally free in following and loving Him. The Gospel does not only bring us the Good-news, but, along with it, is the challenge to witness our life, to lay it down for the sake of our brethren. If dying to one’s self is repugnant for us, then we may be reminded: “If you want to follow me, deny yourself, take up your cross, then follow me.”