December 4, 2024
With so much going on around this season, and my
own personal transition period moving quickly into empty nesting, I am finding
myself overwhelmed and anxious. I realized it is because I am focusing on my
plans and goals and to dos, and those are ever-changing and often out of my
control. Yet when I focus on the why – the bigger picture and purpose for my
life, and the how – the way I go about living and moving in that why, the less
anxious and more free I feel.
Today we will bring attention to what we are
paying attention to and when our “what” is in our way and blinds us, and move
past the “what” of to-dos and expectations and plans, and surrender into the
“why” and “how” of our lives.
Reading today by Thomas Merton
A Prayer
My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I can not know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I
think that
I am following your will does not mean that I am
actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does
in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am
doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from
that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by
the right road, though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always, though I may
seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and
you will never leave me to face my perils alone.
Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude.
