When Excellence Isn't Enough at Work
Is it possible that striving to produce excellent work each day isn't enough for us Catholics? Does Our Lord want something more than this from us this day as we head off to work?
Of course striving for excellence at work is a worthy goal each day. Surely we Catholics can cite the writings of saints and spiritual writers who urge us to attend to our normal, everyday tasks - no matter our state of life, or our particular work - and apply ourselves wholeheartedly to performing those tasks perfectly, or at least as close to perfection as possible. Surely, being halfhearted and sloppy isn't something we Catholics can ever excuse as we go about our daily duties.
And so with this solid foundation and the right attitude, we begin our work each day and stick to it through thick and thin, until the end of our day's work finds us having applied our best efforts. It's all anyone can ask of us. And yet, it's possible that it's not enough for us Catholics to simply produce excellent work each day. It's possible because I think we need to do one more thing. In the words of Abbot Columba Marmion, O.S.B (1858-1923), we need to "Seek in all things to give pleasure to Our Lord."
Let's take the good abbot's advice to heart each day as we go about our business. When you think about it, if we just focus on us doing our work as best we can, we place ourselves in harms way by focusing on ourselves. And isn't this one of the greatest threats to our spiritual lives - our self-centered way of thinking and behaving?
I'm speaking from personal experience here. Not being a theologian, I can't claim to be basing my thoughts on anything more than my experience, along with the application of my reason to my daily reading of Scripture and spiritual writings. But really, is there any of us out there who isn't far too self-centered - unless of course we're already saints or well on our way to sainthood? It's we who stand in our own way when it comes to drawing closer to imitating Christ and thereby drawing closer to God, the essence of spiritual progress. And so any of our daily thoughts and actions that focus our attention on us just bolsters that self-centered inclination. Doesn't that make sense?
And that's why excellence isn't enough at work. We need to recognize our self-centered nature and get past it. Otherwise that satisfied feeling we get at the end of a day where we've done our best work becomes merely a source of pleasure to ourselves. Right?
So how better to overcome our self-centeredness than to "seek in all things to give pleasure to Our Lord."? Here we let Abbot Marmion provide us with his best efforts in explaining what I'm driving at here:
For Him - not us.
Of course striving for excellence at work is a worthy goal each day. Surely we Catholics can cite the writings of saints and spiritual writers who urge us to attend to our normal, everyday tasks - no matter our state of life, or our particular work - and apply ourselves wholeheartedly to performing those tasks perfectly, or at least as close to perfection as possible. Surely, being halfhearted and sloppy isn't something we Catholics can ever excuse as we go about our daily duties.
And so with this solid foundation and the right attitude, we begin our work each day and stick to it through thick and thin, until the end of our day's work finds us having applied our best efforts. It's all anyone can ask of us. And yet, it's possible that it's not enough for us Catholics to simply produce excellent work each day. It's possible because I think we need to do one more thing. In the words of Abbot Columba Marmion, O.S.B (1858-1923), we need to "Seek in all things to give pleasure to Our Lord."
Let's take the good abbot's advice to heart each day as we go about our business. When you think about it, if we just focus on us doing our work as best we can, we place ourselves in harms way by focusing on ourselves. And isn't this one of the greatest threats to our spiritual lives - our self-centered way of thinking and behaving?
I'm speaking from personal experience here. Not being a theologian, I can't claim to be basing my thoughts on anything more than my experience, along with the application of my reason to my daily reading of Scripture and spiritual writings. But really, is there any of us out there who isn't far too self-centered - unless of course we're already saints or well on our way to sainthood? It's we who stand in our own way when it comes to drawing closer to imitating Christ and thereby drawing closer to God, the essence of spiritual progress. And so any of our daily thoughts and actions that focus our attention on us just bolsters that self-centered inclination. Doesn't that make sense?
And that's why excellence isn't enough at work. We need to recognize our self-centered nature and get past it. Otherwise that satisfied feeling we get at the end of a day where we've done our best work becomes merely a source of pleasure to ourselves. Right?
So how better to overcome our self-centeredness than to "seek in all things to give pleasure to Our Lord."? Here we let Abbot Marmion provide us with his best efforts in explaining what I'm driving at here:
Seek in all things to give pleasure to our Lord; do all with a great purity of intention. Before each action, say to our Lord, "My Jesus, I wish to do this solely for love of You; and if this action did not please you I would not do it." If we do everything solely for love of Christ it is impossible for Him to fail to unite Himself to us. "The Father hath not left me alone, for I do always the things that please Him." It is the same for us: Our Lord will keep us ever united to Himself if we do all things with the sole intention of pleasing Him."
For Him - not us.
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