Robert J. Wicks - No Problem

Gentle, wise, and sensible advice from an experienced spiritual guide to help you find God in all that you do, and in all that you areand will be.

James Martin, S.J.

Author of The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything

In this thin but rich book, seasoned psychologist and spiritual guide Robert Wicks takes us on a healing walk through the spiritual malaise of much of modern life. No Problem is filled with fresh insights to help us around and over the gritty road bumps of everyday life. This is spiritual writing at its bestfirmly grounded in the wisdom figures of the past and present and psychologically informed with the best of holistic thinking.

Donald Cozzens

Author of Notes from the Underground

From the opening lines of No Problem , Robert Wicks identified what seems to be my eternal struggle: allowing my faith to become more than the words I profess and pray, allowing it to infuse my life with the joy and hope that is at its core. I found myself not wanting to move through the book too quickly, but savoring the daily reflections the way they were meant to be read. This book is perfect for anyone who tries daily to live the faith in the fullest sense but too often gets caught up in the chaos of life around us.

Mary DeTurris Poust

Author of Cravings

Related books by Robert J. Wicks

Streams of Contentment: Lessons I Learned on My Uncles Farm

Prayerfulness: Awakening to the Fullness of Life

Everyday Simplicity: A Practical Guide to Spiritual Growth

Crossing the Desert: Learning to Let Go, See Clearly, and Live Simply

Riding the Dragon: 10 Lessons for Inner Strength in Challenging Times

Simple Changes: Quietly Overcoming Barriers to Personal and Professional Growth

Seeds of Sensitivity: Deepening Your Spiritual Life

Snow Falling on Snow: Themes from the Spiritual Landscape of Robert J. Wicks

Bounce: Living the Resilient Life

Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible , copyright 1991, 1986, 1970 by the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C., and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

____________________________________

2014 by Robert J. Wicks

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews, without written permission from Sorin Books, P.O. Box 428, Notre Dame, IN 46556-0428, 1-800-282-1865.

www.sorinbooks.com

Paperback ISBN-13 978-1-933495-64-4

E-book ISBN-13 978-1-933495-65-1

Cover image Thinkstock.

Cover and text design by Brian C. Conley.

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wicks, Robert J.

No problem : turning the next corner in your spiritual life / Robert J. Wicks.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 1-933495-64-2 (978-1-933495-64-4)

1. Spiritual life--Catholic Church. 2. Spiritual formation--Catholic Church. I. Title.

BX2350.3.W53 2014

248.482--dc23

2013044718

For the Carmelite Sisters of Baltimore.

Thank you for modeling for me what it means to be simultaneously contemplative, relational, and relevant in a challenging world.

Life is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be lived.

Gabriel Marcel

Contents

A Brief Introduction: Create an Inner Workshop

Peter France, the former host of the popular BBC radio program The Living World , relates in his book Patmos that this Greek isle has long had a remarkable healing impact on people. He notes:

It changes people.... In the age of myth, Patmos was a place where the veil that separated the everyday from the eternal was thin. Some feel it remains so [today].... [Spiritual father] Christodoulos traveled to Constantinople to ask the emperor for permission to create what he called a workshop of virtue on the island.... There was a sense of the numinous here, a presence even I felt as a prompting to awe.

The question this book will ask is the following: What if such a workshop could be created or strengthened within us so we could move forward in the spiritual life with the tools we need when we face the challenges of the unknown future? However, for this to be possible, we must be willing to do inner work with discipline, complete honesty, and openness. As spiritual mentor and psychologist Jack Kornfield notes in his enchanting book, After the Ecstasy, the Laundry , to sustain a spiritual practice demands our steady attention. The first task, then, in almost any spiritual voyage, is to quiet ourselves enough to listen to the voices of our hearts, to listen to that which is beyond our daily affairs... [to] step out of our usual roles... [and] to become receptive and open.

Crossing new spiritual thresholds in life takes great faith. It is a little like walking down a familiar street and being aware that we must eventually turn the corner and not know what we will find there. But what we need most is not simply knowledge, as important as that is. While passion is also required, that too is not enough. Beyond these, the development of an inner workshop calls us to a radical change in attitude . This change in attitude is expressed well by the twentieth-century French philosopher Gabriel Marcel, who said, Life is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be lived. How often do we hear from our coworkers, our family and friends, and even in restaurants and stores the phrase, No problem! What if we were to start thinking about our spiritual lives in this way? Imagine the inner space that this might create, allowing us to see our inner lives as blessed gifts to be fully enjoyed and freely shared with others. That would be, indeed, a radical change in attitude.

Yet, such an attitude of intense freedom and openness is like the shy stag of a mystical forest: it is elusive and cannot be sought directly, although when it is present it is easily recognized and felt. We can feel it in the presence of persons who seem to embody such virtues or traits as gratitude, natural compassion, humility, and a deep appreciation of the necessity of healthy interest in both self and others as a way of being open to God. This is what inner formation and what this book, for that matter, is about.

Why I Wrote This Book Now

Recently, I decided to move away from my full-time teaching position at Loyola University Maryland. My goal was to open up more free space to write and give presentations on resilience, maintaining a healthy perspective, and the integration of psychology and spirituality. This turning of the next corner in my life had, and I suspect will continue to have, many foreseen and unforeseen consequences. Past approaches may not be sufficient. New ones will need to be created or gracefully greeted. A lot remains unknown, and the mystery of life, as I view the brief time ahead, is surely precious. As I quietly reflected on this reality, I realized againthis time with a seemingly greater sensitivity because of my own situationhow important inner formation is throughout all of our lives.

As other writers on the inner life would remind us, there is no spiritual retirement. Our healthy psychological attitude and spiritual outlook are the elements that can turn sadness into new learning and greater inner depth. On the other hand, a negative psychological attitude and spiritual outlook can result in our missing so many of the beautiful ordinary joys before us. And so in the preparation of this book I wanted to revisit some of the simple, but essential, lessons of inner formation. I made this inner workshop for myself and wanted to also share it with others who may be turning the next corner in their own spiritual life.