Taking a New Path

Last week's quotation (which I haven't blogged about until today, because the photo took 48 hours to make its way from my mobile phone to my computer!) is by Charles de Foucauld. In translation, it reads, "There is not a moment in our lives, in which we cannot take a new path."

Which I guess I agree with in principle. However, in practice, we are often prone to missing the new path at our feet, and plodding along the same, well-worn track, however poorly it is serving us. Because it takes courage to make a change in our lives, and the ego part of our brains much prefers the status quo. And we also have to be awake, aware of the new path opening in front of our feet.

In my own case, there has to be a definite nudge, a definite call, to take a new path.  And being a bookish type, it has often come in the form of something I have read, from whole books to single sentences, which have jumped off the page and hit me in the face. Or the wise words of a friend or colleague.

For example, my decision to take the path of quitting drinking, five and half years ago, was the result of an unfortunate incident, when I got drunk and incoherent in front of people I respected, and my spiritual director's injunction to "sit with the shame and see where that takes you." I gave up drinking a few weeks later, and have not had a drink since.

The decision to take a new path is often not an easy one. But it is always, always worthwhile, so long as we have thought it through and don't do it on a whim. I believe that our hearts and wills have to be pulling in the same direction as our heads, in order for a new path to be successful. We have to deeply desire to take the new path, not just feel we "ought" to. Ought to, in my experience, rarely works.

For example, I have lost count of the number of times that I have said to myself "I really ought to lose ten pounds." But my will has not been working in harness with my mind, so I have stuck to the diet for a few weeks, and then given up. Because I've not had the nudge, not really desired, with all of me, to lose that weight. My Personal Trainer at the gym wants me to lose a few pounds, but I'm finally happy with my body as she is (after years of self-loathing and beating myself up) - all my clothes fit me, and at 59, I have come to accept a few lumps and bumps as part of growing older. I work out to be healthy and strong, not to lose weight... and, I love chocolate so much! The idea of depriving myself to lose that ten pounds is not an attractive one, so I don't.

What new path may be opening in front of you?