Good Moods, Bad Moods

Yesterday would have been my mom's 82nd birthday. She passed away suddenly last year on May 1st. As I was looking at Facebook today I saw that several people had posted on her timeline to wish her a happy birthday. I had the feeling that they didn't know she was gone. That of course got me thinking!

Last night I was reading my Inner Compass book (written my Margaret Silf). The chapter had to do with sorting out our "moods." One set of moods goes along with the general human condition: good moods and bad moods. The other set of "moods' is really your spiritual barometer and stems from whether or not you are moving closer to or away from God. The premise is that through careful prayer and reflection a person can see how to steer their course in the right direction, no matter the obstacles in front of them. Ever forward right? 

How does this relate to my mom dying and those birthday wishes on Facebook? In her book, Silf suggests a nightly examination; a kind of reflective prayer. One of the ideas is to think about not only how God might have been present in your life that day but also how you may have brought the presence of God into someone else's life as well. This can be done in one way by sharing some part of yourself with another person. I considered that the people wishing my mom a happy birthday were doing just that. They were trying to share themselves with my mom on her special day; to be closer to her (and in my mind and in my belief system thereby bringing themselves closer to God.) I also thought that it was a shame that those well wishers seemed not to know that she was gone. (It should be noted that there was no service for my mom when she died. She and my dad wished for that.)  There is obviously a missed opportunity here. How often do you try and share yourself with someone else? To share the true and honest and best parts of yourself? It really made me think that this sharing should be as often as possible and in whatever way was necessary. An active and concerted effort. 

As for the birthday wishes on Facebook I can only say that if there is someone you want to talk with why not get up and do it right now if you can?
Libby

Inner Compass: Some Ideas

Big Trees State Park-Arnold, CA

Currently I am reading a book by Margaret Silf, titled Inner Compass: An Invitation to Ignatian Spirituality. I learned about Ignatian Spiritual concepts several months ago after reading a book by James Martin, SJ. This book by Margaret Silf, mentioned above, was recommended and so I bought it. The more you read about the same subject the better you can begin to understand it. I offer up the following information which I found to be both helpful and interesting. 

One of the first concepts Ms. Silf describes is how to learn about your own inner landscape by identifying its three parts: Where am I? How am I? and Who Am I? The first outer ring consists of your own personal history. These are things that you cannot change (or are hard to change) such as your place of birth or where you work or where you live. We do most of our everyday living here. The second ring consists of your reactions to things. This is the place where we can exercise some choice. It's also where we can impact others the most with those choices. The third ring is where you are yourself before God. No pretenses, just yourself. Her point is that most people come into conflict when the outermost circle clashes with the innermost circle. How you are living is at odds with how you would like to be (and how God knows that you can be, given the opportunity). The middle circle is where the changes can occur; changes that will bring you closer to the innermost circle and closer to God.

I have gone around and around on this idea and the above paragraph is the best way that I can describe it. Ms. Silf's writing is just fine but she uses some terms that I just don't quite relate to very well. In thinking about things though, what she was suggesting sounded an awful lot like something I learned in college. It's called cognitive dissonance. It's a psychological construct that describes what happens when a belief that you hold to be true is at odds with something that you hear or see or do. It's uncomfortable and we work to rectify that discomfort in any number of ways. I think what she is advocating is resolution through action; changing your behavior through active examination and prayer in order to bring it in line with how you want to be-how God wants you to be. It's how you find your vocation or your calling. And how you move closer to God each and every day.

Libby