Personal reboot

I GIVE thanks to God that I get to have a yearly break from my usual
activities to be able to have a good amount of rest that entails a
change of place, pace, environment and concerns.

It’s a 3-week affair, and this year I had it in Mountain Pines Place,
deep in an elevated fastness of Bukidnon, where city life is turned
off for a while as one embraces the revitalizing air of the rural
rhythm.

The commanding height of the place gives one a commanding view of
elements that include mountain ranges, rolling valleys, the distant
sea in the horizon. Thoughts and realizations seem to match the
panoramic view as they tend to go to distances seldom traveled before.

Giant trees, wild flowers, murmuring brooks, dainty butterflies,
birds big and small and in different colors, cattle and sheep,
whirring insects comprise the immediate flora and fauna. They tend to
detach you from your usual world and reshape your mindset.

At least for me, the effect is instant transformation, a loosening of
tension, a mysterious sensation of relief. The mind and the senses
seem to perceive a different level of reality often lost in the urban
setting.

They seem to soar high and plumb deep into the recesses of the
heart’s universe unvisited in ordinary times. It’s amazing to discover
the many hidden things buried in the heart that just spring up to the
surface on occasions like this.

Gestating and evolving quietly and unnoticeably through the months,
these previously invisible items now make a kind of public appearance,
giving signs and even instructions of what one ought to do or reform
or suppress.

The whole place is cool, literally and figuratively speaking. One
wakes up not to the sound of the alarm clock but to the chirping of
birds. Sunsets are breathtaking, with varying patterns of clouds in
varying hues of red, blue and gray dancing in the skyline, extracting
memories and creating fantasies.

The wind alternates between a whisper and a roar and seems to carry
different messages. Even in one day, parts can be sunny, clear and
crisp, egging the heart to wander far and wide, and other parts can be
gloomy and foggy, leading the heart to look deeper inside.

If only for these effects, the rest that also exacted a high price in
terms of funds and other opportunity costs was all worthwhile. At the
very least, poetic and literary magic dressed up what otherwise were
mere naked facts and realizations.

I am convinced that keeping distance for a while from my usual daily
round actually brings me closer to everything involved there. The
opposite is also true. Even while immersed in my usual activities, I
always notice a certain distance. It looks like a mysterious law that
all of us just have to follow.

But a lot more good things came with my rest. I had a chance to do
sports, to sing and walk and get lost in the woods, and do horseback
riding, and to simply waste time thinking and brooding, activities
that are very elusive in the city. Playing soduku, otherwise sinful in
a busy day, came like a blessing.

I had time to study and review important materials. This year, I had
to teach Latin 2 to young professionals where we explored the
nosebleed-causing forms of the subjunctive mood of verbs in their
different voices and tenses including the slippery pluperfect tense.

It was a good mental exercise that also helped me to reconnect with
the time of the classics where our civilization seems to have its
roots. I also spent time reading on metaphysics, principles of
liturgy, Greek, etc., that surely would give depth and substance to my
work.

Most of all, I had time to pray and meditate with less distractions.
I could feel the soul behaving more at ease and more confident that it
is engaged with its proper object and source of rest. Of course, this
is something very personal and private. But I cannot deny that the
time of rest afforded me that smile of fortune.

Resting, I am convinced, has effects that go beyond the material and
corporeal dimension of our life. Prudently resorted to, it can have
tremendous effects on the spirit. For this reason, we should encourage
everyone to have the proper kind of rest.

We need to give more attention to this need for some personal
rebooting, defining its proper motives and goals and providing the
necessary means for everyone to avail himself of it.