I have been pleasantly surprised with reading up on a personal journey as recommended by Fr Ronald Rolheiser, a Canadian Oblate of Mary Immaculate, on what spirituality is and what prevents us from living a deeper spiritual life. His book - prepared on the lines of reflective chapters that take you deep into thinking on the subject - suggests that each of us has this deep, driving desire, this longing for more. That there is an energy, a life force that is most often experienced as desire or longing. We feel restless, we seem compelled out of ourselves toward something more.
He quotes St Augustine of Hippo (4th-5th Centuries) in support of this: "Our hearts are restless until they rest in you" adding that Augustine was to discover - and become aware - that he desperately needed some deeper direction and so the spiritual quest became the driving motivation of his life. He also discovered that at the root of his restlessness was a longing for God.
Rolheiser talks about this healthy spirituality that keeps us energised and that keeps us glued together. In other words, a healthy spirituality gives us zest and hope; it allows us to experience life as beautiful and worth living. It works against cynicism, despair and bitterness that can paralyse us. A healthy spirituality is also integrative; it gives us a sense of coherence and order, a sense of who we are, where we are going and how life is full of meaning.
Rolheiser recommends that the task is to balance these two sometimes-conflicting dynamics: the creative, chaotic dynamic that energises us that must be balanced with the ordered, disciplined dynamic of our life. Too much chaos and you die of dissipation; too much order and you die of suffocation. A healthy spirituality therefore is the balance between the two, the way we channel that deep, raging fire that is at the core of our lives.
THE TREASURE THAT AWAITS US ALL?
In reflecting on Rolheiser's provided text, I am coincidentally introduced by a close friend to the works of Paulo Coelho, a Brazilian best selling author whom I had not heard of yet. Looking him up on the internet I discover an excerpt from his most famous bestseller, "The Alchemist", which seems to follow on the lines of the Rolheiser text. I am intrigued by this kind of fable approach to inspiring people. This extract - from a conversation between a shepherd boy and the alchemist on the way to the pyramids - is typical of his style:
"....the fear of suffering is worse that the suffering itself" said the alchemist. "And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second encounter with God and with eternity."
"Every second of the search is an encounter with God," the boy told his heart.
"Everyone on earth has a treasure that awaits him" his heart said. "We, people's hearts, seldom say much about those treasures, because people no longer want to go in search of them. We speak of them only to children. Later, we simply let life proceed, in its own direction, toward its own fate. But, unfortunately, very few follow the path laid out for them - the path of their destinies, and to happiness. Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out indeed to be a threatening place. So, we, their hearts, speak more and more softly. We never stop speaking out but we begin to hope that our words won't heard: we don't want people to suffer because they don't follow their hearts."
Still milling over the interesting and stimulating concepts in Rolheiser's thoughts, I am now seeing more and more that they are running on a parallel track with Coelho's mixture of spirituality and storytelling. Such as key passages such as these:
"When each day is the same as the next, it's because people fail to recognise the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises."
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"I'm like everyone else - I see the world in terms of what I would like to see happen , and not what actually does."
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"Every search begins with beginner's luck. And every search ends with the victor being severely tested."
And the one which really tied it all up for me: "There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure."
