From my Journal 20130727Sat

I was a medium to heavy cigarette smoker for ten years of my life. I started smoking cigarettes in college and successfully quit it in May 2000.

I am quite surprised myself I was able to do it but I was... and let me tell you, willpower had nothing to do with it. My quitting cigarettes, to cut a longer story* short, was all about trust.

I did not fight the addiction, I let it go. I let it go by holding on to something greater than it. Since I can not outdo the Devil, I turned to Christ....

And so here I am 13 years later... laying siege with my God on the last bastion of the Devil in my life.

To me, it was impossible to quit... but with God, and with the right attitude of faith, quitting became entirely within the realm of the possible.

It was still difficult. But let me tell you this - the gifts of any recovery from any vice are always worth the effort we put in because more often than not, what we get are always much more than what God originally promises.

For the LORD indeed is peerless and unsurpassed in His generosity to those who love and fear Him.

*This longer story is worth telling... but at another time.

Our Father

Starshine,
our true Father
is the One we choose to obey;
the One Whose will we seek to follow;
the One Whose counsels and commandments
we freely and wholly submit
our body and soul unto.

Ours

Love that thou might live

Starshine, may we always be in love.



Life is all too beautiful,
all too precious, and all too short
to be wasted on hatred and all those species of un-love
that leads one's soul unto ignorance of what matters
the most... here in our time, Now in this life.

Those who live for anger
know that the alienation of hatred
is permanent.

For theirs are those whose spirits move
from wilderness to wilderness
finding neither company
nor safe abode.

But those who live for love
know that, through one may become angry
and restless for a day,
one may always return to love
and find peace.

- selah -

Fugitive to thy own heart!
Exile to thy own longing to return,
live no more for hatred and find safety -
love Now that thou might live.
---<--@

Tricky Angel

Addiction is cunning, baffling and powerful.



"Make peace with your addiction, 
find a place for it in your life, you can do it!
Everybody does it, it's harmless, no one will mind...",
the strange impulse said to my innermost self.

I struggle for answers like Peter sinking in the water.
Many a times I gave in to the temptation and drowned.

But if I held firm, if I stay put, if I trust and not panic...
something else comes to me... in many different guises,
in persons - mine and others, events, places, creatures, things,
above all - through Eucharistic bread and wine - my Savior,
my blessed Savior, my Jesus comes and finds me!

"No, my Jesus will! He will mind. For I am of His flock.
How will I explain this (in confession and in the communion of prayer)
to my most loving God and Giver of all good things in my little life
if I place upon His Throne in my heart a pretender to my love
such as you - Tricky Angel?", I thought to myself.

- selah -

Tricky Angel,
I know you and I know your tricks.

I know you from your mouth - laden with lies,
your tricks from the rottenness of its fruits.

I understand you not and desire of you
no understanding whatsoever.

In the Name of my most blessed Lord Jesus Christ,
highly to be adored and praised, my Savior, my God,
exalted above all the heavens and across all the earth,
by His Blood, by His Wounds, by His Passion, and Cross -
I command you to leave, begone from me!

I choose Jesus.

Do Not Complain

Do not complain - It is a principle of my life.

Do not complain - No matter the reality, accept.

Should I fail, do not complain.

Should I succeed, do not complain.

Should others around me fail, do not complain.

Should others around me succeed, do not complain.

When it is my fault, do not complain.

When it is not my fault, do not complain.

When it is easy, do not complain.

When it is difficult, do not complain.

When in weakness, do not complain.

When in strength, do not complain.

In the throes of temptation, do not complain.

In the grip of sin, do not complain.

In tears, do not complain. In laughter, do not complain.

In pain, do not complain. In elation, do not complain.

In fear, do not complain. In fervor, do not complain.

In neglect, do not complain. In abundance, do not complain.

Alone, do not complain. With others, do not complain.

Set a course for victory and trust to the LORD,

do not complain.

---<---@