Spiritual interior

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Spiritual interior

Sometimes people don’t know who they are. They do not even know if they are a man or a woman, they do not know if they want to be a priest or if they want to be a lay person, sometimes the priest makes mistakes and pretends to be a lay person, and a lay person lives almost like a monk. The confusion of all these concepts and all these feelings is related to the fact that man does not have himself, that is, he does not have his own interior. And this interior has to be formed. How is this interior formed?

In today’s meeting, we will talk about how to nurture our spiritual interior, if we discover it at all. Man does not actually shape himself as much from the outside as from the inside. The most important thing is what is inside a man, who he is. Of course, we are not convinced of that today. If we want to change ourselves today, we say that we change our “look”, change our clothes, change our outfit, hairstyle or anything else that is related to our external appearance, for example our figure, so everyone goes to the gym today, at swimming, training … In itself that is not a bad thing. However, it’s important not to forget what’s inside. Because who we are does not depend on the packaging in which we present ourselves to the world. Sometimes that packaging is just so wrong. Someone is wonderfully athletic, someone is very beautiful, someone has many external talents, can organize a career, can arrange himself in the world … And in fact, he can be a very small person, sometimes, as we say, empty inside. And that is why the issue of the interior is very important for people, especially for Christians. This has been the case since ancient times, when the first monks in the 4th century went to the desert – this is to meet God and shape their own interior. The interior will decide who the human essence is. Therefore, in our life, which passes relatively quickly, although we do not feel it in our youth, our interior does not actually pass away. And that’s why you need to invest not only in what is external. Maybe even with time we will find out that what is external is not so important at all. But you have to invest, that is, take care of your interior. This interior can be called its own identity, which everyone is missing today. Sometimes people don’t know who they are. They do not even know if they are a man or a woman, they do not know if they want to be a priest or if they want to be a lay person, sometimes the priest makes mistakes and pretends to be a lay person, and a lay person lives almost like a monk. The confusion of all these concepts and all these feelings is related to the fact that man does not have himself, that is, he does not have his own interior. And this interior has to be formed. How is this interior formed? It is important not to form it only for yourself. If a man wants to shape his own interior, he should do so first of all in a relationship with God. Discover God. God, as we have said many times, is our beloved Father, He created us for Himself. And only when a man finds a true relationship with Him, understands who he is, what he is for, what this life is heading towards, which on Earth, externally, tends towards death, whatever we say about it – this is simply the reality of our life. And all this so that we invest not only in what is external, but in what we call the interior. The formation of the spiritual sphere is of paramount importance to a Christian. Especially since we meet God inside man, not outside. Of course, someone may be moved by some event in their life and start looking for God – just touched on the outside, but in fact a given situation, which happened outside this man, touched him internally. And he started feeling something he hadn’t felt before. In fact, he began to discover that he has an interior. And it is not just about the aesthetic interior, the interior in the psychological sense … Of course, it is difficult to reject them or separate them from each other in such a very radical way. But in fact, it is about a level of our life that we call the spiritual level. It is not only a psychological level, although it has a lot in common with psychology. Moreover, man is one, and all these dimensions come together precisely in our humanity, in our personality. It is very important, however, to be able to separate and know that the spiritual realm is more than just aesthetics, than psychology, even morality itself. The spiritual realm is what the ancient monks and the Bible before, what we Christians call the heart. It is not about emotions, although they, when a person experiences something, especially when he gets to know another person or gets to know God – these emotions obviously start to work in us and they accompany us. We are, as I said, one. But the spiritual sphere is such – let’s say – space, although it is not any space, it does not fit in us, in our heart, which distributes blood around the body, it is not about the heart, but it is an intellectual property, we would say. This is the sphere of the intellect which is connected with will, with knowledge, with our desires, as we said recently, where a person decides about himself and where he is most himself. This is the heart. And what actually constitutes its identity. And this identity is best discovered in God. So when a person gets to know God, he begins to discover himself as well. Only in relationship with God, in relation to God, can man know himself. It can shape its own interior. He can understand who he really is and find his way in life. It just so happens that many people today cannot find their way. It happens, for example, because they succumb to their weaknesses, emotions, desires, which, unrestrained, not guided by the mind, by reason, make a person tormented in this life, and make a lot of mistakes. At the end of his life, when he gets old, he looks at his life and says, “I didn’t make this life, it wasn’t a good life.” And that is why it is only in relation to God that you can find yourself. It is also not a simple matter. But when man gets to know God, he understands himself better, and when he understands himself better, he begins to understand more deeply his relationship with God. Man meets God in his soul, in his heart, in his conscience, in himself. You have to find your own heart, which Jesus himself also spoke about. There is a wonderful passage that we read especially in Lent, when Jesus speaks of prayer, it is in the Gospel of St. Matthew, Jesus says this: „And when you pray, – and therefore when you meet God, says St. Matthew – do not imitate the hypocrites: they love to say their prayers standing up in the synagogues and at the street corners for people to see them. But when you pray, go to your private room, shut yourself in, and so pray to your Father who is in that secret place, and your Father who sees all that is done in secret will reward you”. This is how Jesus quotes St. Matthew the Evangelist. And when Jesus talks about this little room, he does not mean only that – when we want to talk to God, when we want to connect with Him, we want to be alone with Him, so that we just go into a separate room, so that we can shut ourselves up behind us door, so that nothing disturbs us – all these instructions are, of course, right and necessary, but in fact Jesus is talking about this inner room: about our interior. About this dimension of our personal life where we meet and meet God. And that is why this interior must be looked for. You have to try to get this interior. Of course, we cannot do it entirely alone. Self-reflection undoubtedly helps in this. And this reflection – it is very important to remember this – this reflection comes when we have some free time for ourselves. When we are alone with ourselves, then we also invite God. Many people today are afraid of being alone with themselves. They don’t know what to do then. What does it mean to look internally? In fact, it is a gift from God, when a person begins to stay inside, he begins to discover it, as we have mentioned recently. We discover the interior when a person thinks about himself and when he is alone with himself in silence. But unfortunately today we have a serious problem with that. Modern man is so chased in this world that he hates silence. All the time we are outside of ourselves, we have to do something, we have to be busy. I am not talking about workaholism, that is, about such a compulsion to work, work, and act that today you can simply see, manifest yourself – it is often a sign that we simply cannot be in ourselves, we cannot interact with ourselves. That is why you have to slowly learn to be silent. Lest it not be like it often happens today: we enter the house, immediately turn on the TV, turn on the radio, turn on the loudspeakers, when we are outside we must have headphones in our ears; in itself this is nothing wrong on the one hand – and yet you have to ask: when am I alone with myself? We get into the car, turn on the radio immediately … All the time it is as if we want to stay only on the surface of life. As if we were afraid to go down to the level of the heart. The level where we are with ourselves, where we are. And you have to learn this – precisely in silence, precisely in concentration – even by working in silence. Many people cannot and cannot work in silence. Must have some music outside. This is not a bad thing in itself, of course. On the other hand, when a man only exists like this, when he cannot go for a walk alone with himself, be with himself, when he cannot sit in an armchair alone, when many people today cannot even read a book – although this is already an occupation, it is is not being alone. The book helps us to read us internally, listening to certain thoughts, seeing certain pictures, watching, listening to thoughts or reading thoughts of other people, we begin to understand ourselves better. That is why books are so important, especially if it is not an ordinary, banal book of action, where there are few thoughts about a person, about perceptions, about human experiences, and when they are novels, let’s say at least a little bit focused on some kind of reflection. The same is true of this silence. In this silence, man must be alone with himself. And then he only begins to possess himself. Then he begins to experience difficulties being alone with himself. There are people who have become so involved in this world, so much into this whirlwind that drives us all, without exception, also religious – that they can no longer be alone for 5 minutes alone in silence, without thinking anything. I’m not even talking about a relationship with God anymore, I’m not even talking about prayer. Just be alone with yourself. Today, it is a huge problem for modern man. And that’s why he often doesn’t discover himself, he doesn’t discover his own identity. He is often afraid of himself. It turns out that the only taboo we see today is neither this world – because we know this world better and better. We can see more and more lands, places, human experiences while sitting in front of the TV set, stay in some spheres of human existence, but we often don’t know ourselves. The biggest taboo, the biggest unknown, which we walk around so as not to touch it, we are often on our own today. This taboo is today’s man for himself. Hence, a huge problem exists in today’s people who get bored with this world very quickly. If a person does not experience his own interior, then this world seems to be – well, it is as it is – there is no wonder at the world. There is no wonder at the reality that we can discover. Contrary to all appearances, the world can get bored very quickly. Not because it’s uninteresting. Just because we look at it, at events, at people, at problems, at things, at human experiences – we do not look from the inside perspective, we look with the outside eyes. Hence, we get bored with this world very quickly. Even our sex life will get boring very quickly. We get bored very quickly even with friendship with another person … When a person does not look at life from the perspective of his own interior, he does not look at the world from within, the world becomes commonplace very quickly, we get bored. Great writers of the early twentieth century, the first half of the twentieth century, talked about the so-called “boredom” or “nausea” when a person is simply bored with life, not because it is uninteresting in itself, but because it seems to us that life is just as it is, there is nothing particularly interesting there – according to the saying: “The horse as it is, everyone can see.” Oh no. Well just no. Everything takes on a different dimension when we look at the world from within. And it is best to discover this interior by discovering God. So silence – we need it very much. We need a relationship with ourselves. You have to go into this little room. We need to discover this spiritual heart, our spiritual heart from which man is running away today. He also runs away because he is afraid that he will not be able to cope with what he finds there. He is afraid of inner silence. Often there is no proper guide for someone to let him go inside. What to do there? What does it mean only to be? What, will I be staring at the ceiling, into space? Why should I be alone with myself? And this primal resistance must be overcome, this primal misunderstanding. I remember once a certain contemporary Polish artist exhibited his work in a museum in London, modern art and this exhibition of his, this work of his looked like that it was a kind of box that could be entered by several people. This box was in complete darkness. It was also covered with a curtain, and when a group of people, 4-5 people went inside, they were in complete darkness. The interesting thing is that at the beginning you didn’t see anything, you didn’t know what we were there for, what the darkness was supposed to mean, just to sit in the dark … And after ten minutes, by the law of the so-called accommodation, when the human eye got used to the dark, these people began to slowly recognize that there is not only darkness inside, that there are shapes there, that there are some sculptures, some pictures, that you can see a lot there; that after 10 or 15 minutes they were there, they started looking around and the darkness became a brightness for them. They began to notice each other. It turned out that there was some light there, though they had to pass through this barrier of darkness first, such as, I would say, incomprehension, just like the pointless; this simple experience, which many older people associate with what happens just in the darkroom, what happened in the darkroom, illustrates very well what difficulties you have to overcome and overcome in order to be able to be alone with yourself, to discover your inner self, to discover your heart. It is worth doing in relation to our God.

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