I was struck with what Archbishop William Goh said recently during one of his homilies, that every Christian’s personal vocation is love: to serve in and with love. It is as simple as that.
My community has been focusing on the weighty concept of personal vocation these last weeks and it has left some of us scratching our heads as to how to live out our personal vocation in such circumscribed times. Plus most of us are in the business of making a living which may seem at odds with our individual gifts and charisms. As each of us wants to live our life completely exercising the will of God, there is no small level of frustration when we feel we are prevented from living out our personal vocation.
A recent session with Ann Yeong on integration and individuation has had me taking stock of myself, and where I am in these processes. How well am I personally integrated, and thus individuating into the me I have been created to be, an unique and gifted amalgam of strengths and weaknesses? Am I mended together well enough to be set apart in such a way I am the best me ever?
Integration can be examined in three areas: personal context, personal history and personality. How have I taken the context I have been born in (Catholic, Cantonese, Singaporean female), layered in my life experiences which includes the healed scarring events, and swirled it all into my personality to arrive at a whole that exudes inner harmony.
Am I a pleasing, life-giving synthesis of a human being that has no twin in the entire world, and am extremely comfortable in my own skin? I may not be where I want to be but I can certainly say I have been refined, like gold, through the years, and I have picked up no small measure of wisdom, thanks to the discipline of prayer and self-reflection. Where I fail or am lacking, the Holy Spirit supplements with fresh insight, healing and redemption. So I know that my mistakes can always be transformed into valuable lessons that aid me on my journey ahead.
Ann highlighted individuation as becoming a separate entity from one’s personal context; becoming a new entity transcending personal history; and maturing into a unique personal identity and vocation. Self-awareness and self-acceptance are key in this process in order to make choices and decisions in life that come from a place of freedom. It also involves hard work, making deliberate and often difficult choices to work on one’s self.
Underlying all this self work which is a never-ending journey through life, what makes it all worthwhile is it enables us to become the work of art that God envisioned from the outset, then sees coming to life as we cooperate with Him in time. The road ahead may be dark and long, with serpentine twists and turns, however, if I stay grounded in my true and fundamental identity as beloved child of God, I am well placed to live out my personal vocation every single day, adding unique zest and outstanding flavour.
God places us where we need to be (if we say yes in the first place, like Mother Mary did at the Annunciation) at any given point in time so we can fill a deep need*. The question is do we choose to fill that need in a way that is mediocre and lacklustre, or filled with extraordinary love and joy, thereby living out our personal vocation fully.
I so totally get how Saint Therese of Lisieux is the patron saint of missionaries, along with Saint Francis Xavier, despite never having stepped foot out of her cloistered Carmelite monastery. For me, she exemplifies someone who lived out her personal vocation fully for she got it. It’s all about love, first loving Jesus wholeheartedly, then living out that love in little ways.
* Vocation is the place where our deep gladness meets the world's deep need.” ― Frederick Buechner
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