The Lord is shaking me a bit. Extreme pain does it, and I'm grateful! I needed to be awakened to seeing how I have become sucked into way too many temporal problems and issues. Out of balance--and balance or stability is crucial in my hermit life. In fact, stability is one of the Nine S' by which I try to live out the Gospel Rule of Life.
And do I live the Gospel well? I'm not convinced, no. I have many flaws in myself to keep working on--much as I keep plugging away at the manual labor in Te Deum Hermitage (aka hovel house).
I awoke this morning with one of the worst spinal headaches I've had in a long time, maybe a few years. Can't recall as I tend to forget about the steep pain sieges as soon as they lift in intensity. So I had some choices to make regarding how much crushed Excedrin to take, pain med dose, and whether or not to take a med given me for when I really need to be sedated a lot.
I opted against that, for it seems best to try to cope, to try to get up every now and then to do some small task. Mobility and distraction is good for helping the mind handle extreme pain.
And to throw oneself all the more to the mercy of God! That is what I do (and I suspect a lot of people do when the pain stakes reach a critical high).
When in such pain, the sensitivities become acute and keen. What I sense, I sense all the more clearly. And there is a greater desire for being alone with God and away from any relationships or situations that pull me more into the temporal problems and issues that honestly are best handled with prayer and prayer alone.
I must laugh because I let the wood pattern in the hickory floor get to me. I finished it late yesterday (slowly installed over four days' time--a record for slowness!), and when I stood at the doorway and looked in at the impeccable installation as far as carpentry goes, I noticed that I had matched wood tones and hues and grains in such a way that I had created STRIPES in the room! And with the pain level already higher, the stripes seemed to be all I could see.
I tried dubbing the small room the Zebra Room. That was humorous. I noted to self that my reaction was worse due to pain, and when I'd be resting on the living room floor, the stripes in my mind seemed more pronounced than when I'd need to get up to get water and glimpse in as I passed that doorway.
It is amazing what pain can do to the body and mind. Not only can it distort something not worth considering or being bothered, it can also be a sharp reminder of what is priority and crucial: turning all to Christ. For pain can cause a lack of inner peace--serenity, another of the Nine S'. The effect can be like a storm blowing through, causing chaos and disruption. I consider the terrible mudslides in western part of this country--such chaos and destruction from rains penetrating earth bared by forest fires.
Then I sent a message to someone who emails now and then--quotes of various types. I commented how one such set of Will Rogers' sayings are particularly excellent. The person sent back information of being on a spiritual journey as well as physical in helping to construct a monastery school in a South American country.
That turned me all the more to Christ--recognizing my work of prayer for others who are able to go and do unhindered by temporal issues that have rendered them disrupted and in unhealthy, disordered cycles.
Now, I realize I must not stop praying for those with personality disorders and are absorbed in psychologically unhealthy situations; but I must stop being distracted by them nor to try to react and respond. Sometimes we do have to get to a point of knowing there is nothing more we can do for others than pray; and to clear the mind and emotions and soul to be receptive to other prayer assignments that the Lord wills of us.
And also to be open to what is within our own minds, hearts, souls--our temporal and spiritual existence--that needs prayer and conversion, of ourselves.
Last evening and a bit this morning I wrote to some expressing my gratitude for their tolerating and understanding as much as possible, what pain tends to do to me. I was able to clear the air, so to speak, and to resolve all the more to simply keep going, to simply pray through the pain and to beg God's mercy upon my soul.
But as for allowing people with their own issues being frustrated with my way of being and seem to be compelled to try to "fix" me or "fix" my current temporal style of increasingly living not only in but by the Order of the Present Moment, I must decline. I must increasingly live in the Order of the Present Moment with far more faith than what I have exhibited.
And to pray for all souls, and to remember that my reacting to various issues going on about me, is not productive for anyone; and prayer is always productive for everyone.
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