jmb on Nostr: “The continual voice which tells you that your best actions are secretly filled ...
“The continual voice which tells you that your best actions are secretly filled with subtle self-regard, and your best prayers still wholly egocentric—must for the most part be simply disregarded—as one disregards the impulse to keep on looking under the bandage to see whether the cut is healing. If you are always fidgeting with the bandage, it never will.
A text you should keep much in mind is I John iii, 20: “If our heart condemns us God is greater than our heart.” I sometimes pray “Lord give me no more and no less self-knowledge than I can at this moment make a good use of.
Remember He is the artist and you are only the picture. You can’t see it. So quietly submit to be painted–i.e. keep on fulfilling all the obvious duties of your station, asking forgiveness for each failure and then leaving it alone. You are in the right way. Walk—don’t keep on looking at it.”
—C.S. Lewis in a letter to a man struggling with “excessive selfness” (the man’s own words). Also called “morbid introspection” or perhaps even scrupulosity.
A text you should keep much in mind is I John iii, 20: “If our heart condemns us God is greater than our heart.” I sometimes pray “Lord give me no more and no less self-knowledge than I can at this moment make a good use of.
Remember He is the artist and you are only the picture. You can’t see it. So quietly submit to be painted–i.e. keep on fulfilling all the obvious duties of your station, asking forgiveness for each failure and then leaving it alone. You are in the right way. Walk—don’t keep on looking at it.”
—C.S. Lewis in a letter to a man struggling with “excessive selfness” (the man’s own words). Also called “morbid introspection” or perhaps even scrupulosity.