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The Mindful Catholic - Finding God One Moment at a Time
von: Dr. Gregory Bottaro
Beacon Publishing, 2018
ISBN: 9781929266463 , 200 Seiten
Format: ePUB
Kopierschutz: DRM
Preis: 11,89 EUR
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INTRODUCTION
Living Your Faith
Perhaps this is only my own experience and other people do not find it so. But, speaking for myself, I sometimes long to die because I cannot cure this wandering of the mind.
—St. Teresa of Ávila
The moment one learns to doubt, difficulties begin. The Garden of Eden was paradise until the slimy serpent planted seeds of doubt in Adam’s and Eve’s minds. Our lives begin without much complication until we start to worry if everything is really going to be OK. The human experience is fraught with a multitude of problems that in many ways stem from doubt.
Have you ever had a restless night of really bad sleep? Racing thoughts can keep anyone awake. It seems like your mind is able to handle the day fairly well, but as soon as the lights go out and your head hits the pillow, your brain gets fired up when all is quiet and still, and your mind gets to work. Thoughts come as if from nowhere. Despite your best efforts, you can’t make them go away. You might try turning over, getting up to use the bathroom, putting on a noise machine, or taking some cocktail of herbs and supplements. Yet there they are, as soon as you settle down again, firing up once more and ready to force your attention to keep them company through the midnight hours.
Maybe you’ve had the experience of driving to work or school, or riding on a bus or train, to find yourself surprised when you get to your destination. “Oh wow, we’re here already,” you think. In a moment you realize that you were not paying attention to the trip. If you were driving, you might wonder if you stopped at a certain stop sign, or how you managed to turn right or left where you were supposed to if you were not paying attention. Your confusion only grows as you try to remember and nothing comes to mind.
How many times have you been in church listening to the priest give a homily, only to realize that you can’t remember what the Gospel reading was about? It isn’t rare for my wife to ask me what I thought about the homily and, to my embarrassment, I tell her I don’t remember a single word of it—even if we are just walking out of Mass!
Have you ever prayed a Rosary, only to get to the third decade and think to yourself, Which mysteries are we praying today? I have.
Whether we are carrying out routine life behaviors, trying to pray, or even in conversation with others, the way our minds work significantly impacts how well we function. God made you for greatness, and he made your mind so that you can use it to achieve that greatness. Most people are living their lives without realizing they are missing so much. This book is all about gaining control of your mind so that you can use it to your best advantage and live up to your highest potential. You will discover truths about the way God created your mind, and the ways it can be held back. You will also discover ways to bring your mind back to a place of optimal functioning and experience the life-changing way that being more fully alive brings peace and joy. Most people are, in many ways, walking around asleep in their lives. You can wake up, and you can be freed from the traps that your mind leads you into.
Our minds wander because we are trying to get ahead of the fact that things are not always OK. At the most primal level, this is because we doubt. Christianity, however, offers the solution. Jesus is our hope, and to believe in him is to believe that all will be well. God provides assurance that we don’t need to doubt. Trusting him is the antidote to doubt, and trust is the foundation of our faith. When we trust God and his promises, we enter into a relationship with the Father that is destined for eternal union. Along the way, this relationship means growing every day in peace, letting go of doubt, and accepting all aspects of life as manifestations of God’s will.
This book is based on the integration of four decades of scientific research with thousands of years of Catholic spirituality. Since we are created as a union of body and spirit, it makes sense that what is good for our spiritual lives is also good for our bodies. In terms of the science, the parallel discoveries about what is healthy for the mind and body will be introduced to you here. These discoveries actually began as a program to treat chronic pain, which now has matured into a robust form of treatment used to help people find relief from anxiety, depression, eating disorders, addiction, insomnia, scrupulosity, anger, marital difficulties, parenting difficulties, spiritual difficulties, and a host of other problems. These are proven treatment protocols that people use to overcome normal stress, anxiety, exhaustion, and even depression. Those ideas are part of what is called “mindfulness.”
Mindfulness
A definition of mindfulness that we can work with is “paying attention to the present moment without judgment or criticism.” It is a way to be aware with acceptance. It can also be understood as coming to our senses, or very simply, waking up. Mindfulness helps us to become aware of the workings of our minds in a new way. We learn to see just how easily our minds are distracted from the present moment, and how much our avoidance of discomfort actually hurts us.
We are created in the image of God, who is the infinite epitome of mindfulness. If mindfulness is awareness of the present moment, God is the present moment. He defined himself as “I am who am.” God sees all as a present moment, and it is our goal to see as he sees. We will never see all as he does, but we can see what we see with the light of the present moment.
Here’s my proposal: I want to invite you to explore an idea here that has the power to change your life. Since we are made in God’s image, we are his children, destined to be like him. We operate at our best—body, mind, and spirit—when we claim our heritage and live according to this nature. Trusting God is the foundation for living this way. When we trust God, we know that all will be well. We see with his kind of eyes, which means that even if we don’t know what is about to happen or why, we know that all will be well. This security allows us to fully live in each moment, with all of our capabilities. It allows us to learn from our missteps, accept others in theirs, and grow into the man or woman that God created us to be. In a sentence, it is the real path to holiness and happiness.
You will learn how to be with whatever is happening at the moment, without letting the negative aspects of life overwhelm you. Mindfulness practice has been consistently shown to bring about long-term changes in levels of happiness and well-being. It not only prevents depression but also diffuses the power of stress, anxiety, irritability, and impatience by allowing us to stop the cycles that those emotions typically ignite. Mindfulness was originally used, to great success, to treat chronic pain. In fact, the latest research shows mindfulness having an effect equal to—or in some cases better than—morphine to treat chronic pain. It has also been shown clinically to cut the rate of depression by 50 percent for those suffering major depressive disorder. It is quickly becoming a preferred form of treatment, at the very least to accompany antidepressant medication and in many cases instead of it. Catholic mindfulness, then, grounds all of this research and practice in a context that goes beyond the psychology.
The underlying brain patterns that are improved with mindfulness also correlate to greater creativity, better memory, and faster reaction times. Have you ever known someone who is very quick-witted? Chances are he or she is tuned in to the present moment.
Are you living up to your greatest potential? Are you as happy as you could possibly be? Most people experience a mix of happiness and frustration, anxiety, sadness, or anger. That is certainly the human condition, and I’m not proposing a way of eliminating all suffering. I am inviting you, though, to go deeper in your understanding of the way God created us. By doing so, you will discover an untapped wellspring of peace and potential.
Our lives are meant to be a journey of continual renewal, or conversion. Even when we’ve lived through a lot, we can still grow more. One of the most humbling experiences I’ve had in my life is teaching mindfulness to others. Every time I present the course, and every time I walk this journey with someone, I am reminded of all the ways that I need to grow in being more present and less avoidant of discomfort in my life. I am reminded how much more I need to grow in my trust in God’s love and care for me.
There are daily temptations to fall back away from the reality of God’s love and be pulled once again into the frantic race of life. Unless you are a monk spending many hours in recollection each day (and monks face the same struggle), the obligations of life tear you away from a sense of inner peace. Add to that the physiological reality of hormonal activity and fluctuating moods, and you end up with a very colorful array of human experience.
These fluctuations are a part of being human by God’s design. A “bad...