In my reading this week, I came across this passage in a letter written by author Elizabeth Lesser to religious scholar Huston Smith. So many times in my life, and in the sessions I do with clients each week, I see that our daily struggles boil down to these issues:

In his best selling book The Road Less Traveled, Christian psychiatrist M. Scott Peck listed four techniques he found essential to good mental health: the ability to delay gratification; the acceptance of responsibility for one’s choices and actions; commitment to facing the truth, even (and maybe especially) when it’s painful; and balancing--doing all these things in appropriate moderation. By balancing, he means delaying immediate gratification by doing the hard things first as a typical practice, but also allowing oneself the joy of spontaneity at times. Balancing means accepting responsibility, but for everything that happens; we must hold others responsible as well when it’s appropriate. Isn’t balancing what Lesser is addressing?

"It’s hard to be a person," said the painter Georgia O’Keefe. I laughed when I read this simple and profoundly true statement. Peck talks in his book about "stupid suffering" and "smart suffering." Everyone has trouble in their lives and relationships. Some people choose to remain asleep to their contributions to their problems. They blame others in their lives, or  circumstances, for their problems. If they do  accept responsibility, they cite personality traits in themselves they describe as unchangeable: "I’ve always been this way. It runs in my family. There’s nothing I can do." Their "stupid" suffering will certainly continue, and they will learn nothing from it.

We who are seeking healing, and the courage to change our lives, suffer also. But we choose to struggle consciously with our pain. We take on the struggle Lesser describes so well. And this is "smart suffering"—because, given that we are human and will suffer—we choose to take on life's pain and face its truth. And as a result, we learn and grow. 

We who choose to live wide awake in our lives see that recovery is a spiritual process. We begin to take our own moral inventory, as the Twelve Steps have it, watching to see that we are not living for ourselves alone. If we have done something wrong, we admit it promptly and make amends when we can, because this is how we live responsibly with others and keep our lives clean. We dedicate ourselves to facing the truth about our lives and make a regular practice of prayer and meditation to insure we stay awake

And as we walk this path, we make the most marvelous discovery: We receive a peace, a serenity, that is more precious that anything we have known before. This serenity is what we Christian call a "fruit of the Spirit." It is available to everyone who seeks to live a life of integrity, a life dedicated to truth.

Walking this spiritual path takes courage. Thank you for choosing to invite us at Courage2Change to accompany you on your journey.