This month the UU A Way
Of Month book selection is Following The Path: The Search For A Life Of
Passion, Purpose, and Joy by Sr. John Chittister. Sr. Joan’s little book helps
us reflect on the primary existential questions of why was I born, and what is
the purpose of my life?
“Happiness, I have come
to understand, comes when what I choose to be about in life is actually worth
spending my life doing.” P.22
“To discover and pursue
what we are called to do in life is the very fundament of happiness.” P.24
I have often said to
myself, “It’s not a bad life if you know how to live it.” And figuring out how
to live it as I have gone along has been very important to me. Where this idea
came to me from, I don’t know, but I have strongly held it and reminded myself
of it throughout my life. Having told this to myself, I also am quickly aware
that I don’t usually know how to live it, but it is much clearer what I shouldn’t
do so I go forward humbly seeking God’s will for me.
“To have a vocation meant
having the mark of God on the soul of the one reserved to do the work of God.” P.25
“But at the same time,
those same two qualities – knowing that we have within us something that marks
each of us in a special way and that this quality has been given to us for some
reason greater than ourselves – are the essence of coming to wholeness. The
task of determining what that quality is and what to do with it is the single
great work of being alive.” P. 25
This sense of vocation, a
calling from God to do something important with one’s life, is the basis of
faith. Our first experience of faith is feeling that other people have faith in
us. People who love us and care for us are expecting something important for us
in our lives. Who, in your life had faith in you? Hopefully it was a parent, or
great parent, or some other relative, but sometimes that faith in us comes from
people outside the family like a teacher, a coach, or a mentor of some other
kind.
And did you ever express faith
in someone else’s life? It is the greatest gift of marriage and parenting to
nurture and care about the other person’s growth and development. Helping
ourselves and others become their whole selves we become co-creators of the universe.
Becoming who we really
are, being on the right track in our lives, actualizing our potential is the
most satisfying and fulfilling thing in life which makes us happy. Stephen
Gaskin said that ultimately the only thing we have to offer another human being
is our own state of being.
Chittister writes, “I
decided to write this book because I am at the stage of life myself now where
being able to look backward is an important credential, too much underrated and
too often overlooked.”p.27
She goes on “And finally
it may help those too – for whom most great public decision making is now
largely over – to come to understand their own lives, to complete them, if
necessary, and to make peace with circuitousness of its journey to fulfillment.
Then that warm mist of happiness which the philosopher Aristotle said could not
possibly come much before the end of life can finally be quietly, serenely
wallowed in.” p.28
Chittister ends the introduction with a quote from Thomas Browne,
“Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible sun within us.”
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