Others fear failure:
Whenever such a person thinks of doing some business, he fears it may fail or face hindrances, plotting of competitors, or dishonesty of partners. If he is poor he fears becoming needy, and if rich fears robbery, and in all cases he keeps afraid.
Some people fear dangers.
If such a person takes an aeroplane he fears some calamity would happen, and he remembers such things published in newspapers. In any means of transportation he is in fear of accidents. All dark memories come to his mind in this respect and this makes him always afraid.
There is a type of people who fear their own weakness.
Such person fears his inability, his forgetfulness, his weakness before the power of his competitors or adversaries, and his inability to withstand. This makes him lose his self-confidence, the spirit of bravery, and the power to take an initiative. The image of inability and failure is always before his eyes. He even fears sin and feels unable to resist it.
Such fear causes a person confusion, disturbance and trouble, and may paralyze his ability to work.
It will have a bad effect on his soul and nerves. Fear will appear on his features, on his looks, on his voice and on his movements. He will tremble, become pale, and his heart beats increase. Everybody will see his fear which appears in his behavior, his hesitation, his inability to take decisions, and his seeking protection.
Fear may lead some to dejection. They put before them the words, “anyone who finds me will kill me.” (Gen 4: 4). A spiritual person, on the other hand, does not fear, but peace reigns over his heart, giving him confidence.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Fruits of the Spirit
Category: VOCATION
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The more you have a clear goal, the more you are settled and balanced.
The brain functions the best when there is a goal that the person is pursuing. The higher the goal, the more positive the emotions.
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Your glory is in your personality, not in your position or authority or outer appearance. Your glory is in your essence, in your spirituality, in your nature, in your sense, in your wisdom, in all that is found within your heart of virtues and good qualities.
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“Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life, and it is the main obstacle between you and a shitty first draft. I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won’t have to die. The truth is that you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren’t even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they’re doing it.”
―Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird -
The question in every life: How to truthfully discern what is from God what is obedience to Him (Lord, what do You want from me?) and what is from “this world” (and from the one behind it)? Questions about one’s calling. My own life is that of a churchman. But every year I feel more and more burdened-from weakness. Or is my real calling something different? I truly suffer from constantly asking myself this question. I live a double life-one consuming the other. Does God want this? Is this the condition of my salvation? When I ask this question, I have no answer. And I am 55!
What else is needed? Look—all of you who rush about in vain. Do not think that something else is needed. See the fight of light with darkness, the descent into death. It is at the same time the revelation of the power of evil and its destruction. That is where one would find the answer which everyone is seeking and often finding in pitiful idols. Lazarus and Palms: “Rejoice, and again I say rejoice…” at the very beginning of Holy Week and at the same time, the onslaught of darkness. (“I am deeply grieved, even to death…” and
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”) and of light (“Now the Son of Man has been glorified and God has been glorified in Him…”) up to the bright silence of Holy Saturday. Where else should one search for the solution to problems? Where else can one see, feel the only ray of light which illumines and solves everything?
What God reveals to people is unheard, impossible, and the tragedy consists of this deafness. And this revelation can no longer penetrate Western life without ripping it apart. What is revealed surpasses and therefore tears apart life-the gift of joy “which nobody will take away from you.” Genuine Christianity is bound to disturb the heart with this tearing-that is the force of eschatology. But one does not feel it in these smooth ceremonies where everything is neat, right, but without eschatological “other worldliness.” This is, maybe, the basic spiritual quality of any bourgeois state of mind. It is closed to the sense of tragedy to which the very existence of God condemns us.
I don’t know. It’s so difficult to express it, but I clearly feel that here is a different perception of life, and the bourgeois state (religious, theological, spiritual, pious, cultured, etc.) is blind to something essential in Christianity.
—Alexander Schmemann
Journals -
153. YOUR COMFORT AND THE COMFORT OF OTHERS
A noble person does not build his comfort on the weariness of others. But the noble one is he who sacrifices his comfort in order to comfort others.
A mother might feel comfort in having her son by her side while the son, at the same time, might find comfort in being far from home. He might travel, migrate, become a monk or live on his own with a wife. Here, the noble mother would let him go without insisting on her comfort by his side.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Words of Spiritual Benefit Vol. IV
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Chrysostom: On giving to the poor
Sometimes when I read the early church fathers I find their writings impenetrable. This might be because the translation is hard work or because the debates and concerns just don’t connect. Other times I am stunned by the power of prose and the immediacy with which it speaks to us today in different cultures, 1800+ years later. This quote is in the second category. Watch how Chrysostom demolishes our arguments for not giving to the poor.
“Immediately accusations are brought against the applicant. For why does he not work, you say? And why is he to be maintained in idleness? But, tell me, is it by working that you have what you have? Did you not receive it as an inheritance from your fathers? And even if you work, is this a reason why you should reproach another? Do you not hear what Paul says? For after saying, ‘If anyone will not work, let him not eat,’ he says, ‘Do not be weary in well doing.”
How often have you heard the complaint about the beggar being idle or not making an effort to work? And many will answer Chrysostom by saying, ‘we did work’ for what we have. But did you get everything that way? Your childhood home, parental care, education, food, clothing, opportunity? How much of that was yours through no effort of your own but instead your good luck to be born where and when you were?
But John isn’t finished, we have more objections to pull down.
“But what do they say? He is an impostor. What do you say, O man? Do you call him an impostor for the sake of a single loaf or of a garment? But, you say, he will sell it immediately. And do you manage all your affairs well?”
I’ve heard countless the times the argument that we shouldn’t give money to the beggar because he will misuse the gift, spend it on drink or worse. And have you never spent money on something you shouldn’t? Hypocrite, John calls us, and he’s right.
“But what? Are all poor through idleness? Is no one so from shipwreck? None from lawsuits? None from being robbed? None from dangers? None from illness? None from any other difficulties? If, however, we hear any one bewailing such evils and crying out aloud and looking up naked toward heaven, with long hair and clad in rags, at once we call him, ‘The impostor! The deceiver! The swindler!’ Are you not ashamed? Whom do you call impostor? Do not accuse the man or give him a hard time. But, you say, he has means and pretends.”
The other claim I’ve heard as an excuse not to give is that really this beggar doesn’t need it, he has a Rolls Royce somewhere, he’s probably better off than I am. Well, John has an answer to that too.
“This is a charge against yourself, not against him. He knows that he has to deal with the cruel, with wild beasts rather than with rational persons. He knows that even if he tells his pitiable story, no one pays any attention. And on this account he is forced to assume a more miserable guise, that he may melt your soul. If we see a person coming to beg in a respectable dress, ‘This is an impostor’, you say, ‘and he comes in this way that he may be supposed to be of good birth.’ If we see one in the contrary guise we reproach him too. What then are they to do? Oh, the cruelty, Oh the inhumanity.”
So what then are we to do?
“‘Give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow from you.’ Stretch out your hand; let it not be closed up. We have not been constituted examiners into others’ lives, for then we should have compassion on no one. When you call upon God, why do you say, ‘Remember not my sins’? So, even if that person is a great sinner, make this allowance in his case also, and do not remember his sins. It is the season of kindness, not of strict inquiry; of mercy, not of account. He wishes to be maintained; if you are willing, give; but if not willing, send him away without raising doubts. Why are you wretched and miserable? Why do you not pity him yourself, but even turn away those who would as well? For when such a one hears from you, ‘This person is a cheat; that a hypocrite; and the other lends out money,’ he neither gives to the one nor to the other, for he suspects all to be such. For you know that we easily suspect evil, but good, not so easily.”
So, think again next time you rush by the beggar in the street.
SO GOOD QUOTES 