Reflections by Ron Rolheiser, OMI
Deep down, all of us know we’re special, that we’re not just accidental, meaningless little chips of energy falling off the conveyor belt of cosmic evolution, indistinguishable from billions of others.
This sense of being special doesn’t just set off holy and altruistic energies inside us. It also inflames us with narcissism, grandiosity, a sense of entitlement, jealousy, rage, boredom, restlessness, and (ironically) the sense that God does not exist.
We all struggle with this, whether we admit it or not. In fact, it’s when we don’t admit it that we become most bitter in life. When we’re most enraged, it’s precisely because what’s divine in us is not being recognized, acknowledged, and properly honoured by others and, not least, by ourselves.
We get a privileged glance into this struggle when we look at the lives of many artists, pop stars, intellectuals, and other high achievers. Often what’s evident in the life of such a person is that, first, he or she is highly attuned to creative energy, to what’s divine inside the world. However, often times by the same token, he or she is also a person who has to struggle, and mightily sometimes, simply to fit into the flow and the discipline of everyday life, to be “normal”. The person who is highly sensitive to creative energy is often too, by that exact same energy, driven towards addictions, sexual entitlement, jealousy, pathological disquiet, deadly boredom, the rejection of God, and sometimes, sadly, towards self-destruction.
This kind of struggle should not be seen simplistically, as is often the case, as the result of somebody being a spoiled brat, a child deity in a highchair, who’s never had to discipline himself or herself to fit in with the rest of the human race. What’s illustrated rather is a universal struggle, just more clearly choreographed, to live out the fact that we’re made in God’s image and likeness.
We’re born into this world with divine fires inside us. Inside those fires lie seeds of every kind, both for self-destruction and for greatness.
To read more click here
