People who know nothing of God and whose lives are centered on
themselves, imagine that they can only find themselves by asserting
their own desires and ambitions and appetites in a struggle with the
rest of the world. They try to become real by imposing themselves on
other people, by appropriating for themselves some share of the limited
supply of created goods and thus emphasizing the difference between
themselves and the other men who have less than they, or nothing at all.
They can only conceive one way of becoming real: cutting themselves off
from other people and building a barrier of contrast and distinction
between themselves and other men. They do not know that reality is to
be sought not in division but in unity, for we are "members one of
another."
---Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
How do you save yourself from yourself? Half a century or more steeped in the ethos of a world that holds up nothing but mirrors, and you eventually admit that it's impossible. One needs, like C.S. Lewis, to one night drop to your knees and admit to the Lord that you can't do it yourself, that He'll have to do it for you.
Then you pray, continuously, in the midst of an arid wasteland, that He will hear you. And you understand, in His failure to answer you, that He has. And you go about His business, in darkness.
And I know their mother's ages
And I know all the stories so well
And I know I'll see their faces in Hell
So wipe away their traces
Blow the dust off from the shelf
Because I'm still in love
I'm still in love
I'm still in love
With nothing but myself
Justin Currie, Still In Love
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