\u2026Within a day of relative silence and solitude, I found not peace but an inner restlessness. It\u2019s always been there\u2014and perhaps always will be\u2014it\u2019s driven me in my academic pursuits and in my drug abuse, at my best and at my worst. And it was certainly what drove me to the Church. But I always found the famous quote from St. Augustine\u2014\u201dO Lord, our hearts are restless until the rest in You\u201d\u2014to be more of a torment than a comfort, a prickly accusation that I was not resting in God because my heart was still so damned restless.<\/p>\n
The only real difference between my restlessness at the monastery and my restlessness elsewhere was that at the monastery I couldn\u2019t cover it up. I\u2019d intentionally left behind my cellphone, my laptop, and even most of my books (except a Bible, Augustine\u2019s Confessions<\/em>, and Merton\u2019s\u00a0Thoughts in Solitude<\/em>). It is doubtlessly a testament to my restlessness that in slightly more than two days I\u2019d assembled two 500 piece jigsaw puzzles that had been left in the room. Eventually, though, I had no choice: I just had to sit and be with my restlessness. In a rocking chair in the corner of the room, facing a window that overlooked the monastery\u2019s apple orchard, I rocked my unquiet heart like it was a colicky child.<\/p>\nI thought I knew the cure: if I just knew what I was\u00a0supposed<\/em> to be doing with my life, this would all stop. I\u2019d grown increasingly skeptical of whether a career in academe was the right path for me\u2014research, which I did love, seemed such a self-centered pursuit and I was growing weary of the disciplinary echo-chamber. The thought of religious life had occurred to me long before I\u2019d become a Catholic and the idea still tempted me.<\/p>\nSurely God will show me what to do<\/em>, I thought. After all, I\u00a0want to do what God wants me to do. He just\u00a0needs\u00a0<\/strong>to show me.\u00a0<\/em>In short: I had trusted God, I\u2019d become a Catholic, I was ready for action, and now God was\u00a0supposed<\/em> to provide me with a destination. After all of this, surely I was\u00a0entitled\u00a0<\/em>to a destination. I couldn\u2019t be meant to restlessly stumble about forever, could I?<\/p><\/blockquote>\nmore<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"from Catholicism for Cutters: \u2026Within a day of relative silence and solitude, I found not peace but an inner restlessness. It\u2019s always been there\u2014and perhaps always will be\u2014it\u2019s driven me in my academic pursuits and in my drug abuse, at my best and at my worst. And it was certainly what drove me to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1071,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[144,285,78,284,27],"class_list":["post-7376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mackerel-snapping","tag-and-if-my-prayer-go-unanswered-thats-okay","tag-augustine","tag-home-is-anywhere-you-hang-your-head","tag-john-henry-newman","tag-vocation"],"yoast_head":"\n
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