There are homilies that get stuck in my head. There are those that I forget as soon as the priest moves on to the next part of the mass. The one I heard last Sunday belongs to the first kind.
The priest appeared quiet and scholarly but his metaphors revealed that he was updated with the latest news and showbiz controversies. He got everyone’s attention. My son chuckled when he mentioned the “Pinoy Big Brother Teen Edition.” What struck me, however, was his observation that having a roadmap does not ensure that we will get to our destination in the same way that having someone in the car who knows how to get there will.
Hearing him say that made me feel like a comic book character with a bright light bulb inside my thought bubble. He was talking about something profound, about Jesus being the Way, the Truth, and the Life. What I remembered related to more pragmatic concerns: Articles I clipped about what to do after getting out of the rat race, my cookbooks, my make-up books, my fashion books, my gardening books, and all other how-to books that I’ve accumulated to learn skills that I have not mastered until now. Maybe I just need someone who knows all these things, get her to teach me, and save me time, I thought.
Then again, some skills need more than just a good teacher to learn. Some destinations need more resources than just having someone who knows the way to get there. Having that someone helps a lot though.
For the past few days, my friend Ishilta has been helping me in what he calls the “soul journey”. It sounds esoteric but it is not. It’s about taking stock of your life, how you got there, and where you want to go.
One of the exercises he prescribed was making a pie chart of how I spend my day. I don’t function properly if I get less than eight hours of sleep. A third of my time pie went to that. I was surprised to learn that I drew a very little sliver for spending time with my family. After the initial guilt attack, I realized that it would not help if I hover around my son (or my husband, for that matter). They just want to know that I’m nearby. The sliver is now a bigger slice.
Another exercise is a “turning points” map of my life. It is similar to the way we learn Filipino history in grade school: In terms of important events. My first turning point was being asked to repeat kindergarten by my first school. At that time though (I was six years old), my self-esteem was in shreds and I felt so angry. Nowadays, I’m very grateful it happened. Moving to a non-Catholic grade school meant not having the baggage that people who went to conservative Catholic schools have. I can actually say that I like being a Catholic and mean it.
This week, we’re doing exercises on creativity, abundance, and attitudes about money. I have an inkling of what my pie chart on how I spend my money will reveal—that I’m not living as simply as I said I would. Since the point of the whole self-discovery journey is finding out if I am walking my talk, maybe I’ll discover that I’m not really into simple living. Besides, simple is a very relative term.
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Email: lkemalilong@yahoo.com