A rediscovery

I stumbled upon an old favorite book today - Always We Begin Again by John McQuiston II. It's about incorporating Benedictine practices into your everyday life. It's a short - but powerful - read.

Here is a passage I'd like to share:

The Twelve Stages of Humility

The first stage of humility
is to keep the sacred nature of consciousness
and the world in which it exists
always alive within us.

Everything we think,
everything we do,
everything we feel,
is cast in time forever.
Every moment that we live is irreplaceable,
therefore each moment is hallowed.

We must be on guard
against despair, against fear,
against bitterness, against self-seeking,
and have the tenacity and courage
to think optomistically and act affirmatively,
and to put the needs of others always before
our own.

The second stage of humility
is to distrust our own will.
Our wants are insatiable
and our will is the product of those wants.
Our pleasure,
our needs,
our wishes --
all are mere self-interest
and the demands of self-interest
are never ending.

Our desires are the path to disaster,
At every turn there is something more to acquire,
something to distract our attention,
something to divert the unchangeable footprints
we leave behind.

Day and night we must return to humiliity,
and use it as a compass to guide us on the true course.

Therefore the second stage of humility
is not to love our own will,
nor to find pleasure in the satisfaction of our own desires,
but to carry out the unfathomable purpose of our being,
to fulfill the design that can only be discovered by overcoming our own cravings --
for the function of existence
and of our lives
is not of ourselves.

The third stage of humility
is to accept our limitations,
even to death.
To accept that there are events
outside our control
which will control us,
and that have ultimate power over us,
and that our will
will not be done.

The fourth stage of humility is to be patient
and to maintain a quiet mind,
even in the face of inequity, injury, and contradiction,
preserving the certitude
that we are continuously shaped by experience
and refined by fire,
and accordingly to be thankful even for injuries.

The fifth stage of humility
is not to conceal our faults,
but to be ruthlessly honest
with ourselves
and about ourselves,
for to lie about ourselves or to others
is to falsify our relationship with true life.

The sixth stage of humility is to be content
with the work we are given to do
and with the circumstances of our lives
however unfair or demeaning,
consistently bearing in mind
that it is our outlook
that confers value on our experiences,
and that nothing that occurs to us
is intrinsically good or bad.

The seventh stage of humility
is not only to declare ourselves to be humble,
but to believe in our hearts that we are
of no consequence.

For alone we are of no moment --
in the vast reaches and endless memory of
the universe
our most profound idea is the merest fantasy;
our greatest triumphs
and our meanest actions
are as lasting as a mark in sand.

The eighth stage of humility
is that we take no action except that which is
in accordance with the path established for us,
by word and by example, by those whom we know to be true guides,
both past and present, always mistrusting our own ideas and wills.

The ninth stage of humility
is that we refrain from judgment.
It is not for us to live the lives of others,
or to understand the infinite forces at work
at every instant in another's life.
We must restrain not only our criticism
but also our advice,
offering it only when requested,
and then only with sincere misgiving.

The tenth stage of humility
is to refrain from taking pleasure in the losses of others.
If we have sincere empathy we can never
believe ourselves superior to one another,
nor take pleasure in each other's shortcomings and misfortunes.

The eleventh stage of humility
is to speak gently, and briefly.
Participation in community requires
that we speak, and also that we listen.
In speech we must be candid,
in listening we must be accessible.

The twelfth stage of humility
is to maintain not only humble thoughts,
but also a humble demeanor,
whether at work, or on the road or at the market,
or in speaking or at rest.

We should continously reinforce
through appearance and demeanor
the mien of humility.

By daily pursuing these intentions,
we will begin to observe these precepts
through habit rather than by discipline,
and in consequence,
after long practice,
we will sometimes accomplish these goals
as our natural manner.