Chittister - Radical spirit: 12 ways to live a free and authentic life

C onsider this moment another step in your search for a direction in life that is tried and true. It intends to open your heart and mind to the wellspring of your spiritual self. It can launch you down the path to the fullest kind of human development.

This book is an invitation to internal freedom, to the achievement of the free and authentic life. Most of all, it is rooted in ancient spiritual wisdom that echoes the insights of the ages and, at the same time, sings of a fresher, truer tomorrow.

You are not alone in your quest. The quest for internal freedom and an authentic way of life is common to everyone, to every generation, to every era. But few, other than the ancient mystics, contemplatives, and spiritual seekers of the ages, have had real answers for how to achieve it. Abba Zosimas, a monk in fifth-century Palestine, instructed his disciples very clearly about the inner chains that hold us captive. He told them, It was well said once by a wise person, that the soul has as many masters as it has passions. And again, the Apostle Peter says, People are slaves to whatever masters them.

This book is about recognizing what has mastered us and then discovering what it will take to break those chains.

Chained to the present moment by agitation, anger, our addictions, anxieties, fear, stresswhatever the spiritual wrestling match of the daythe pursuit of freedom in a world in perpetual motion is an ongoing one.

In this society, in fact, the search for personal freedom has become big business. Whole industries have been constructed around itfinancial consultantships, pharmaceuticals, psychology, tourismall of them purporting to provide the process for finding personal peace, the tools for removing angst, the way to escape ourselves. But those things never really work. They serve for a while to dampen the groaning, empty pain of it, perhaps. But, in the end, the strictures arise to chafe again. And the first question is always, Why?

Why this impression of internal captivity? Why this sense of emptiness in me? Why my resistance to change? Why the everlasting weight of ghostlike burdens we simply cannot seem to shrug off? And then the second question, Is there no way to deal with this? With what plagues us? Is there no way to escape this? Is there no help, no direction anywhere that can soothe the irritation, subdue the endless ambition, relieve the demands for more in me?

Yes, actually, there is. Self-understanding, a commitment to spiritual growth, a spiritual tradition that has stood the test of time, and a spiritual guide to companion us on the way are the components of the spiritual journey. Each of them requires conscious attention. Each of them is clear.

The understanding of what blocks my growth in life requires deep honesty from me. The struggle to unbind myself from the passions that hold sway over me takes both discipline and support. The search for a spiritual tradition that points me beyond mere religious ritual to a spiritual true north gives me an established path to follow. And, finally, the steady presence of a spiritual guide to help me find my way from one question, one step, to the next along the way is a lifelong guarantee of spiritual freedom from the demons within.

And that is why I wrote this book. There is a spiritual document written in the age of Zosimas that gives us a veritable program of liberation. It is a spirituality for the whole of life. Designed to free us from our troubled selves and so from the effects of a self in turmoil, it leads us from one spiritual dimension of life to the next until, eventually, all of life becomes one sacred act.

The Benedictine spirituality that is the foundation of this book is centuries old, but the humility that undergirds monastic spirituality which emerges in Chapter 7 of the sixth-century Rule of Benedict is timeless and lives on to this day. The Twelve Steps of Humility are the centerpiece of this book, in fact. Not because they are old but because they model a way to the freedom of heart and soul which we seek. Best of all, they are sure proof that such freedom is possible in a world where demagoguery is the new political brand, where narcissism is too often misunderstood to be leadership, where pathological individualism in the name of freedom and independence is confused with healthy personal development and spiritual maturity.

This entire document is about growing into the consciousness of God. But, the key to this quest lies, Benedict says, in humility. These twelve steps are explicit and basic to any group, any relationship, any search for God in life. Theyre about recognizing the place of God in our personal lives. Theyre about learning from the wisdom figures we discover in life so that the good they did for us we can go on doing for others. Theyre about coming to grips with the nagging hungers of the self. Theyre about realizing the spiritual impact of our own growth on the human relationships around us. Theyre about becoming authentic human beings, honest about ourselves and free from the narcissistic nonsense that drives the modern age to glory in itself. Theyre about being free to become the bestthe restof ourselves without the chains of false expectations.

Grappling with these deep-down, heart-hardening things takes the soulful persistence of a lifetime, and yet, ironically, it is these things which we confront in ourselves that are exactly the parts of ourselves most worthy of our own patience and mercy. The demons with which we struggle as we go through life are the very things that make for our greatness. In fact, its these that make us holy and tender with others while they bring out the best in us. And it is these for which we need the most guidance, the most understanding, the most support.

The Twelve Steps of Humility, I have learned over the years, are a spirituality program for a lifetime, the kind that never loses meaning, and so never really gets old. They turn us toward the God of Liberation through all the stages of our growing.