St, Gabriel Possenti Helps Us Yet Again To Sancitfy Our Work

We'll conclude our time with St. Gabriel Possenti today, with the remains of the Resolutions he so generously wrote down to share with us. Without further ado, here they are with some comments sprinkled in between:

I will not permit myself to become interested in vain and useless things.

Getting down to work generally means excluding all forms of distraction that take away from our performing our duties with fervor and exactness. Without being rude to others, stick to what's on our plate. And do try to suppress any tendency to daydream or even to think of things that must be done in the future.

I will rejoice at the success of others.
I will practice charity and kindness, assisting, serving and pleasing all.

Putting others first isn't easy. We want to succeed. We want to advance in our career, make more money, etc. But not at the expense of others. Strive to even rejoice at their success, even as we strive to succeed ourselves.

I will shun particular friendships, so as to offend no one.

Sometimes our preference for this person vs. another can cause hurt to the one less preferred. Our saint is aware of all this and knows how people thing and feel. Can we be as considerate as he in how we treat others?

Every morning and evening I will practice some act of humility, and gradually increase the number.

What might that act be this morning? And let's not use that old easy excuse that we're busy and have to get to work. Note that we're not simply urged to accept a humiliation, but to actively engage in some humble act. It could simply be acknowledging our littleness in the Face of the Great God. Or it could be paying attention to our spouse who would like something done either before we begin our work, or at some point during the day. The possibilities are, as they say, endless.

I will close my heart against disquiet of any kind.
I will suppress immediately all emotions of impetuosity and all affections that might cloud my mind, even lightly.

Working in a calm and peaceful manner is the ideal, especially for us impatient types. But practice makes perfect. So try to "catch" our tendency to impatience or, in other cases, anxiety, worry, etc. Catch it before it mushrooms. Do this at every opportunity.

I will obey the voice of the Superior as if it were the voice of God himself.
In my obedience I will neither examine the why nor the wherefore.
I will conform my judgment to that of my Superior. 

Our boss is a kind of superior, albeit that we don't owe the sort of aboslute obedience our saint owes to his religious superior. If we run our own business, our customer and clients are a form of "boss." Our response to their requests, or demands, must not find us procrastinating or even murmuring about the inconvenience of having to respond promptly.

I will not employ time in conversing about purely worldly matters.

While normal, friendly conversation may require reference to worldly affairs, let's not get entangled in long conversations about subjects like politics, sports, TV shows, celebrities, etc. We have more important and, yes, more interesting things to attend to, especially at work.

“Faithfulness in little things” is the motto I will always follow in my efforts to reach holiness.

Like St. Therese, the Little Flower, and Father Willie, our saint understood the importance of attending to the "little things" and practical and spiritual benefits that flow from this. While "Don't sweat the small stuff" may make some sense in pursuing a strategic plan for our company, our own attention to detail in our daily tasks should not be neglected.

I will try to reproduce in myself whatever I see edifying and virtuous in the conduct of others.

When we see good example in others, we can emulate when it makes sense. Of course, our best examples would be Jesus, St. Joseph, and so many saints.

I will give to God the best that I have — the entire affection of my heart.

If we work for the greater glory of God and reinforce this with an aspiration like "All for Thee" throughout the day, we can hope to reach the this state of "the entire affection of my heart" that our saint notes here.

So there it is: St Gabriel Possenti's Resolutions. We think they can be most useful for us on both a spiritual and a practical level as we work though our days.