Patience and self-forgetfulness

I BELIEVE that the practice of patience is unavoidable in

our life. We have problems, difficulties and all sorts of negative

things that can happen everyday, and one way or another we are forced

to bear them, even if we don’t quite like bearing them.

  

            Of course, the ideal is to develop patience as a virtue,

something that we should willingly and lovingly do, based on our faith

in God who knows what to do with every predicament we may get into. We

should also willingly and lovingly do it, fully aware that a lot of

good can be derived from practicing this virtue in the spirit of

Christ.

            Patience is first of all a grace of God that we should

constantly ask for. But it is also a virtue that we need to develop

ourselves. And as a virtue, a good part of it consists in simply

forgetting ourselves.

  

            We have to discipline ourselves so that we can develop the

attitude of readily doing the will of God no matter what it costs.

God’s will is expressed in his commandments and implied in the events

of our day that we have to learn to relate to God.

  

            With self-forgetfulness, many of the difficulties that we

have would actually just disappear, since these difficulties usually

arise due to the exaggerated consideration our egos give them. When we

manage to forget ourselves, that is, when we try to slay our egos,

life is cleared of many of its problems and difficulties.

  

            To slay our egos, we have to learn not to take ourselves

too seriously. In fact, we should regard ourselves as nothing but

servants, always thinking of God and of the others, ever eager to

serve them. In this way we follow what St. Paul suggested:

  

            “In humility count others better than yourselves. Let each

of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests

of others…” (Phil 2,3-4) From there, St. Paul talked about imitating

Christ in his self-emptying.

   

            Our self-forgetfulness should reflect this self-emptying

of Christ. It may take the form of not getting over-sensitive,

especially when we are insulted and mocked. In fact, it may be a good

idea to expose ourselves as early as possible to insults and

mockeries, so we can develop a certain immunity towards them.

   

            We have to learn the art of holy indifference and the

practice of dismissing certain stray thoughts and reactions that are

not helpful at all to us nor pleasing to God. We have to learn not to

worry and, instead, develop that healthy sense of abandonment in the

hands of God.

  

            Somehow we have to learn to be sport in the sense that

whatever happens in our game of life, we continue to be of good

spirit, to be calm and cool. We have to learn to be quick to forgive

and to forget, not allowing resentments to settle in our hearts.

  

            We should be cheerful all the time, positive in our

outlook and encouraging in our words. In this way, we would actually

be identifying ourselves in a very concrete way with Christ who went

through his passion and death with serenity.

  

            Let’s empty ourselves so as to be filled only with the

things of God and of the others.