Opening ourselves to unexpected insight and love

Insight and love parallel each other. Just as an open mind is required for insights to emerge, an open heart is needed for love to manifest.

The challenge is that both insight and love cannot be manufactured. They can be stimulated or cultivated, but they usually visit us like a serendipitous encounter. For love and insight to visit us, we must first understand ourselves and the thinking and feeling traps we usually fall into that may prevent us from being open.

It is a dance between our willingness to be vulnerable and our need to protect ourselves. But just as dancing may make a fool out of ourselves at times, the right timing can feel like grace – where everything falls into place perfect harmony with ourselves and those around us.

Mark 8:14-21. Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened?

[DAILY GOSPEL INSIGHTS AND REFLECTION FOR MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION 2023-045: FEBRUARY 14, 2023]

From fragments to puzzle pieces

It’s not anymore an exaggeration to say that we’re living multidimensional lives. For each dimension or fragment, we project a part of ourselves that may be different from other contexts. We can have our work self, our family self, our friend self, and even a lover self.

Each dimension would have different demands, and sometimes (or oftentimes), this leads to us living fragmented, inconsistent, and inauthentic lives.

Our challenge: how do we turn seemingly incompatible fragments into coherent puzzle pieces that paint a more holistic and integrated picture of our best self?

It takes a continuous cycle of attentiveness to our various experiences, intellectual and emotional understanding of our tendencies, reasonableness in our assessments, and responsibility in our decisions and actions.

Matthew 5:17-37. Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.’

[DAILY GOSPEL INSIGHTS AND REFLECTION FOR MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION 2023-043: FEBRUARY 12, 2023]

Overcoming our blind spots

We all have blind spots, those areas in our lives where we cannot see our own biases and limitations. They can be dangerous traps that prevent us from growing and experiencing the full range of life’s possibilities. Blind spots can be like a dense forest, where it is easy to get lost and never find our way out.

Our challenge is to be soberly self-aware, almost like having a map of the dense forest that is our minds. We can only do so by reflecting on our thoughts, actions, and behaviors until we understand our patterns, tendencies, and weaknesses.

When we have discovered our weaknesses and blind spots, it is through our faith in others and the love we receive that we can overcome our blind spots.

Mark 7:31-37. And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.

[DAILY GOSPEL INSIGHTS AND REFLECTION FOR MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION 2023-041: FEBRUARY 10, 2023]

Moving away from insights

Deliberately moving away from insights may be like intentionally avoiding light. We are more prone to trip or fall into traps in times of darkness, but deliberately avoiding light means we relinquish the benefit of the doubt.

Innocent ignorance may be bliss, but deliberate ignore can breed malice.

Mark 7:14-23. All these evils come from within and they defile.

[DAILY GOSPEL INSIGHTS AND REFLECTION FOR MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION 2023-039: FEBRUARY 8, 2023]

Unexpecting patience, responsible hope

“The two hardest tests on the spiritual road are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter.” – Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die

We pray petitions and other kinds of devotions, usually in hopes of a particular desire being manifested. But it is a slippery slope where hope can become expectation, and expectation can lead to disappointment and resentment.

Maybe the insight is that our patience should not be expecting and we should manage our hope responsibly. “Responsible hope” may refer to a hope that is well-grounded, realistic, and mindful of the challenges and uncertainties that come with pursuing a goal or an aspiration. Responsible hope is not about blindly expecting but being faithfully optimistic.

Mark 6:53-56. They laid the sick in the marketplaces and begged him that they might touch only the tassel on his cloak.

[DAILY GOSPEL INSIGHTS AND REFLECTION FOR MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION 2023-037: FEBRUARY 6, 2023]