Becoming Yourself

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Tag: Richard Rohr (Page 2 of 8)

The Freedom of Finding Your True Self

May 11, 2024 / / 0 Comments

One of the main reasons I started this blog in 2017 was to map my own journey toward finding my true identity. The real me. My deep self. Who I am apart from the various fleeting hats I wear. Teacher and author Richard Rohr has been an important part of that journey. In his recent Daily Meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation, he spoke so compellingly on that topic that I wanted to share it with you. I hope it helps you on your own journey toward Becoming Yourself.

We shall not cease from exploration / And the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time.

T. S. Eliot, four quartets

In the Everything Belongs podcast, Father Richard speaks about the spiritual path that winds both away from and toward one’s true home:  

The first going out from home we can say is the creation of the ego. While this is a necessary creating, it is also the creating of a separation. It’s taking myself as central. We probably need to do that, at least until we reach middle age. But then we need to allow what we’ve created to be uncreated. Maybe I was a great basketball player, but that’s gone now. Or maybe I was good-looking, but that’s gone now.  

When we can say “yes” to that uncreation and still be happy, we’ve done our work. My True Self is in God and not in what I’ve created. My self-created self gave me a nice trail to walk on, and something to do each day, but it isn’t really me. It might be my career or my vocation; yet as good as it is, it isn’t my True Self.  

In the metaphor of life as a journey, I think it’s finally about coming back home to where we started. As I approach death, I’m thinking about that a lot, because I think the best way to describe what’s coming next is not “I’m dying,” but “I’m finally going home.” I don’t know what it’s like yet, but in my older age I can really trust that it is home. I don’t know where that trust comes from or even what home is like, but I know I’m not going to someplace new. I’m going to all the places I’ve known deeply. They’re pointing me to the big deep, the Big Real. I do think homecoming is what it’s all about. [1] 

Father Richard continues to reflect upon finding his home in God in this season of his life:  

Well first, I have to say, I don’t fully know how to live there. I’m used to living for 80 years out of building an education, a persona, a reputation, a career. When we’ve worked at those things for so long, on a very real level we don’t know how to live without them. But thank God, they’re taken away from us. God slows us down, I think necessarily, or we won’t fall into the True Self.  

My understanding of the second half of life is mostly homesickness for the True Self. I want to learn to be who God really created me to be. And I think all God wants me to be is who I really am. [2]  

As shared in the May 6, 2024 Daily Meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation (cac.org) [1] Adapted from Mike Petrow, Paul Swanson, and Richard Rohr, “Tips for the Road,” Everything Belongs, season introduction, ep. 5 (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation, 2023), podcast. Available as MP3 audio and PDF transcript.  [2] Adapted from Mike Petrow, Paul Swanson, and Richard Rohr, “The Two Halves of Life with Brené Brown,” Everything Belongs, season 1, ep. 1 (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation, 2024), podcast. Available as MP3 audio and PDF transcript.

How to Find Relief from Negative Emotions

September 16, 2023 / / 0 Comments

If you’re anything like me, sometimes you just feel down. A general sense of malaise, a nebulous depression, an insubstantial gloom. In those moments, I’ve found significant help in trying to identify and name the source of my feelings. Finding understanding and clarity doesn’t fix my problem, but it helps me get a hold of it, makes it tangible, and gives something I can work on.

I recently read a quote that provided a new tool to do just that:

If anxieties focus on what might happen, and hurts focus on what has happened, disappointments focus on what has not happened.

Brian McLaren, Naked Spirituality

I find these three categories extremely helpful. Am I feeling low because I’m:

ANXIOUS about something that might happen?

HURT by something that has happened?

DISAPPOINTED by something that has not happened?

After asking these questions, if I’m still struggling to pinpoint the source of my feelings, I go through the categories of my life to see which one triggers a spike in my negative emotion. I get alone somewhere quiet and think about my career, my health, my finances, my wife, my kids, my friends, my parents, God, etc. I consider them one at a time, as if I’m holding that aspect of my life in front of me like a jewel and examining it from different angles. Usually, if I’m honest with myself, something clicks. I feel a “no, no, no, no, yes – that’s what I’m anxious about (or hurt by or disappointed in).”

Anxiety, hurt, and disappointment are natural, understandable human emotions. We all experience them at different levels throughout our lives, sometimes as minor inconveniences, sometimes as near death blows. It’s normal and healthy to allow ourselves to feel and process these emotions in a balanced way, neither ignoring nor wallowing in them. They often have positive things to teach us, important lessons that can help us grow into a better, happier version of ourselves.

That said, once you’ve identified WHY you’re feeling badly – because you’re anxious, you’re hurt, or you’re disappointed – here are some questions to ask yourself that may help you learn the helpful lessons and clear away the storm clouds:

ANXIETY

Is there a reasonable, fact-based probability that what I’m dreading will come to pass? What percentage of things I’ve worried about in the past have actually come true? Of those that did happen, how many were as bad as I had imagined? Is it worth allowing this potential event in the future to steal my joy and peace in the present?

HURT

Am I sure of the facts regarding the situation that hurt me? For example, was the person’s motive truly to wound me or was it unintentional? Even unintended actions can be painful, but not as much as deliberate ones. What do I wish would happen now that might help me heal? What actions do I wish others would do? Can I ask them? What actions can I take to ease my pain? Have I subconsciously participated in my own wounding?

DISAPPOINTMENT

Am I confident what I wished for would really bring me the joy I imagined? What other hope in my life has come to pass that I can be thankful for? Is there another positive future thing that I can shift my focus toward?

The next time you feel the storm clouds gather, take a moment to ask yourself – “Am I ANXIOUS about what may happen, HURT by what did happen, or DISAPPOINTED by what has not happened? What specific aspect of my life has me feeling that way?” When you’ve gotten clarity on the cause of your feelings, ask yourself the appropriate questions above. Answer honestly. If you do, you’ll feel a healing breeze begin to blow, and you’ll take another important step toward Becoming Yourself.

The quote above that served as the catalyst for this post is actually from a longer passage on prayer shared by Richard Rohr in one of his daily email meditations. If you have a more spiritual bent or are interested in how prayer helps us find God in difficult times, I highly recommend reading that post here.

This post was originally published March 28, 2020.

Photo by Rach Teo on Unsplash

Find Peace by Releasing Your False Self

August 19, 2023 / / 0 Comments

In last week’s post, I shared the writings of Richard Rohr on how recognizing our false selves can bring peace. This week, I wanted to share a follow up post in which he explains the benefits of taking the next step—releasing our false selves. This concept has been so helpful to me that I wanted to share it with you. I hope it aids you on your journey to Becoming Yourself.

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Father Richard further clarifies what he means by the false self: 

Our false self is not our bad self, our inherently deceitful self, the self that God does not like, or we should not like. Actually, our false self is good and necessary as far as it goes. It just doesn’t go far enough, and it often poses and thus substitutes for the real thing. That is its only problem, and that is why it’s called “false.”

Various false selves (temporary costumes) are necessary to get us all started, and they show their limitations when they stay around too long. If a person keeps growing, their various false selves usually die in exposure to greater light. 

Our false self, which we might also call our “small self” or “separate self,” is our launching pad: our body image, our job, our education, our clothes, our money, our car, our success, and so on. These are the functional trappings of ego that we all use to get through an ordinary day. They are largely projections of our self-image and our attachment to it. [1] 

Contemplation teaches us how to detach from this self-image. For example, I’m happy to dress as a priest at the appropriate time and place, but I don’t do it all the time, because then I get too attached to that image. Any self-image, positive or negative, held too tightly, reinforces our attachment to the false self. We don’t need to think of ourselves as better or worse than each other. I am who I am as the image of God and that levels the playing field. [2] 

When we are able to move beyond our separate or false self—as we are invited to do over the course of our lives—it will eventually feel as if we have lost nothing.In fact, it will feel like freedom and liberation. When we are connected to the Whole, we no longer need to protect or defend the mere part. We no longer need to compare and compete. We are now connected to something inexhaustible.      

To not let go of our false self at the right time and in the right way is precisely what it means to be stuck, trapped, and addicted to our self. (The traditional word for that was sin, the result of feeling separate from the Whole.) Discovering our True Self is not just a matter of chronological age. Some spiritually precocious children see through the false self rather early. Some old men and old women are still dressing it up. If all we have at the end of our life is our separate or false self, there will not be much to eternalize. It is transitory and impermanent. These costumes are largely created by the mental ego. They were useful to us in our development. Our false self is what changes, passes, and dies when we die. Only our True Self lives forever. [3] 

As shared in the Aug 9, 2023 Daily Meditation by the Center for Action and Contemplation (cac.org), [1] Adapted from Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2013), 27–28. [2] Adapted from Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond(Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation, 2020–), online course. [3] Rohr, Immortal Diamond, 28–29. 

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