Thomas Merton – Becoming Myself.

Paul writes – For anyone engaged with or interested in the deeper questions of self and in becoming more fully and authentically human, or who feel bogged down in issues of “mid-life” and identity, Catholic Priest/Monk Thomas Merton is an indispensible guide and companion on the journey. Here’s a quote (originally) from him from his Seeds of Contemplation (pub. 1949), now contained in New Seeds of Contemplation. The quote is from page 64.

“...In order to become myself I must cease to be what I always thought I wanted to be, and in order to find myself I must go out of myself, and in order to live I have to die.

The reason for this is that I was born in selfishness and therefore my natural efforts to make myself more real and more myself, make me less real and less myself, because they revolve around a lie.

People who know nothing of God and whose lives are centred 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 [and others]. 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 emphasising the difference between themselves and other [people] who have less than them, 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 [people]...”  

Comments

[+ Alan]

Good stuff, Paul. I saw this and it made me think of the small book I'm reading right now - Becoming Who You Are: Insights on the True Self from Thomas Merton and Other Saints by James Martin, SJ (available through Amazon). It's good so far - talking about becoming who you are created to be, not imitating someone else, bouncing off Merton's talk about the same subject. Might be worth checking out. Peace.

[Paul Fromont]

Thanks Alan. It's been in my Amazon basket for a long time, but you're the first person I know who's reading it, so I think I'll bump it up the list on your recommendation. Peace to you and yours.