Today's ink is a teaser from my first book...

I was listening to a compilation of one of Joe Rogan's podcasts.

And he said, "you know, I'm not a really disciplined person. A lot of people see me and they think that I'm this disciplined person. When I'm the most undisciplined person, I just got lucky to find things I enjoy. And I'm disciplined to do those things."

I think that's the key there... the nuance to voluntary suffering and entering the Path of Contemplation and Atonement.

It's finding something you enjoy doing––something worth suffering for. This is the definition of love.

What is love?

Love is not an emotion or a feeling.

Love is a free act of the will––a conscious decision; willing the good of another, as other. St. Faustina said in her diary, the greater your capacity to suffer is in direct proportion with your capacity to love.

The greater your capacity to love, the greater your ability to suffer will be. In layman's terms, find something worth suffering for.

The perfect example of, sacrificial, love? Look no further than Jesus on the cross. Who, over 2000 years ago died for a wretched, selfish, and prideful person like myself.

He endured his passion out of love for me. The Rosary, is the Bible on beads, where we meditate on the life of Jesus.

Sorrowful Mysteries

One of the mysteries of the Rosary are The Sorrowful Mysteries––contemplation on the Passion and Death of Jesus. They are an insight into not only Jesus' suffering but also human suffering as a whole.

The Sorrowful Mysteries consist of:

1. Agony in the garden.
2. Scourging at the pillar.
3. Crowning with thorns.
4. Carrying of the Cross.
5. The Crucifixion.

Fun Fact: In ancient times there was no word to explain the pain and torture endured during a crucifixion. So they had to make one up. It's where we get the word "excruciating."

"Ex" meaning "from."

"Cruc" meaning "cross."

"From the cross."

When contemplating on the Rosary I try to think, "where do I fit in this scene?"

1st Mystery, Agony in the Garden, "where have I been addicted to my sin?"

2nd Mystery, Scourging at the Pillar, "what are my disordered attachments to pleasure? My base passions and emotions?"

3rd Mystery, Crowning with Thorns, the head of Jesus is attacked. "How are my wicked thoughts leading me to do things I really don't want to be doing?"

4th Mystery, Carrying of the Cross, "how can I take ownership of my problems, embrace suffering and challenges, but embrace them with love, with a kiss like Christ did?"

5th Mystery, The Crucifixion, dying for the community. "How can I do the things I'm doing, but not for myself, but for others?"

The '5 Elements' and the Rosary

I realized each of the 5 Sorrowful Mysteries are tied to the 5 Elements of a Strongman.

1. Strong in Mind: Jesus is in the garden where His soul is tormented by sin. Sacred Tradition holds that the pain Jesus endured in His soul was more painful than the scourging, crowning with thorns, and crucifixion.
   Because for the first time, Jesus experience separation from God the Father as all of the sins of the world came upon him. I ask myself, how can I amend my life and die to the thoughts which do not serve me?
2. Strong in Body: Jesus' body was whipped and torn apart. The Prophet Isaiah says he was beaten beyond recognition. To the point He did not look like a human person.
   The images we see of Jesus on the Cross, these pretty European images, are for our benefit. To not show us the true savagery and evil of what sin does to the human body
3. Strong in Emotions: Crowning with Thorns. How can I better respond to my emotions?
4. Strong in Spirit: Carrying of the Cross. The spirit is the deepest part of the soul. The human conscience. How can I carry through regardless of circumstance?
5. Strong in Community: The Crucifixion. Jesus found something worth suffering for and dies for the community, His bride.

12 January 2024 I was doing research on what is now the "4 Paths." After gaining clarity I new something was "missing." After taking ownership of the problem, then what?

What is Lent?

The answer was given to me two months later during the Lenten season of 2024 while I was going through Stations of the Cross. Lent is a penitential season in the "Proper of Time" of the Church calendar.

• Advent (the beginning of "the mission." On Mission, “En Missione.”)
• Christmas
• Lent
• Holy Week
• Sacred Paschal Triduum (Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday)
• Easter Time
• Ordinary Time (33 Weeks)
  • Solemnities of the LORD during Ordinary Time. The Feasts of:
    • Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe
    • The Holy Trinity
    • Feast of Corpus Christi
    • Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Durning the Lenten season it's common to "give something up." But most Christians don’t understand the true meaning of Lent nor can they articulate why we celebrate it. Here's what Lent is NOT.

1. It's not, getting ashes on your head to remind you of your mortality and that you’re in sinner. Though its part of it.
2. Nor is it abstaining from meat on Friday out of respect for the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ of Nazareth for dying for us. Though it's part of it.
3. It is not making the Stations of the Cross in memorial of Christ's Passion and Death. All though part of it.

Like Christmas, Lent has been reduced to "giving things up." The true meaning of Lent is entering the Soul-Building Process (More on the Soul-Building Process in my upcoming book).

The Meaning of "40"

Lent is 40 days of self-denial and preparation for what is to come––the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We see the number "40" sprinkled all over the Bible and in our everyday lives:

• 40 days and nights for the flood.
• Moses sent the 12 spies out for 40 days.
• The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years.
• Moses and Jesus fasted for 40 days.
• Jesus appearing to Our Blessed Mother and the 12 Apostles for 40 days.
• There are 40 gestational weeks in a pregnancy.

40 represents a period of preparation, and trial, for something to come––and what is to come is a new creation. After Jesus is baptized, the spirit takes him into the desert to be tempted by Satan. The coward that he is, after Jesus' 40 days of fasting, satan comes to Jesus in his most weakened and vulnerable state. And does something subtle.

He challenges Jesus' identity.

“If you are the Son of God…”

Satan tempts Jesus in the same way you and I are tempted today. He tempts him with: pleasure, pride, and possessions.

The Desert Journey

Think about a desert for a moment. What is in a desert. Obviously you have sand, nature, and wild beasts. But there is something very subtle in a desert.

In a desert, you have NOTHING. It's an environment where you are stripped of everything: worldly pleasures, electronics, food, etc. You're stripped of pleasure, pride, and possessions. The only thing you have to hold on to is, your identity, the truth of who you are.

When you find yourself at your lowest moment in life and you don't know who you are, from a spiritual perspective, you're in trouble.

It's in your most vulnerable moment, stripped of everything, when you will be tempted and challenged. How will you respond? Will you take the path of depression? Ascension?

This is why without religion WE ARE LOST. Today we deny religion. "Oh, I don't like organized religion but, I am a spiritual person."

You know who else doesn't like organized religion and is a spiritual person? Lucifer, the devil, satan. The reality is, without religion we're lost. Just look at the current state of affairs around us.

The Diabolic

The word "diabolic" (DIÀ-BALINE) means to dissect, to break apart. So in Latin, "diabolic" means to tear apart, to rend asunder. If you look at the word religion in the Latin, "RELI-GIO" means to bring together. To bind. Therefore, by definition, religion is reconnecting with our cause of being and our final end. Unfortunately many today deny religion.

Primarily, if we're being honest, so we can do whatever we want. Venerable Fulton J. Sheen said, "you hate religion? Then your conscience bothers you."

When we deny religion we are lost and have no connection to who we are.

Thought experiment.

What would happen if you lose your job? Got divorced? Or lose a family member? You see these tragedies happen and people go south. Why? Because our identity, happiness, joy, fulfillment, and purpose are tied to pleasure, pride, and possessions.

We attach who we are to what we do and to what we have.

"I'm a kettlebell coach; I'm a top executive; I'm an athlete."

These are not who you are, though they are part of you, they are what you do.

So when we lose these things the only thing we have to hold onto is our identity. But if we don't know who we are, because we've denied the virtue of religion, we're lost.

The consequence is being trapped in the Soul-Chasing Life: Chasing happiness, meaning, and fulfillment in what is finite. Leading us to the Toxic Cycle and sedation, I.e., "self-care", to escape the pain of our reality.

Do hard things

Lent is your desert journey with Christ where you die to yourself, mortify your base passions and emotions, and grow in discipline and self-mastery.

It's a form of voluntary suffering to grow in virtue and become a better man, husband, and father for your community. So, yes, during Lent we give something up. Something which brings us pleasure. But ultimately, we want to give up ourselves; Die to ourselves. As Saint Paul says, I must decrease so He, Jesus, can increase.

With the ultimate goal of not going back to that way of life and thinking. And the great thing about Lent is, you don’t need to be Catholic to participate.

All you need is to... be willing to do hard things.

Each Lent, personally, I don't give anything up. To me that's too easy to do. I want the hardest path possible. Each year I make a commitment to do something uncomfortable. In 2024 I made a commitment to do the Stations of the Cross (also know as "Stations") each Friday of Lent.

Then I closed Lent with a 12 mile ruck march, wearing a 35 pound ("dry": meaning, not including the weight of my water) ruck sack, in 3 hours on Good Friday. Starting at 12:00, ending at 15:00, the hour Jesus died on the Cross.

The 4th Path

It was in the reflection of the 6th Station, where Veronica wipes the face of Jesus, that God spoke to me. At this point I'd been doing Stations for a few weeks and never noticed it.

"Lord, help me to decide to tear off, through penance, this pitiful mask that I have fashioned with my wretched doings.... Then, and only then, by following the path of contemplation and atonement, will my life begin to copy faithfully the features of your life. I will find myself becoming more and more like you. We will be other Christs, Christ himself, ipse Christus." Roman Missal-3rd Edition (2375)

It was a "light bulb" moment for me. God answered my question from January. This was the "4th path." The Path of Contemplation and Atonement.

Once, and only when, you take ownership of the wound, can the journey down the Path of Contemplation and Atonement begin. It's where you enter your desert journey to have an encounter with Jesus to discover the truth of who you are. This truth is identity #2, your supernatural identity.

Identity #1 is the belief you hold about yourself, positive or negative.

Your supernatural identity is, you are a son of God. A son and heir of the Most High God. THIS is your GOLD, your power, your identity. Your "gold" is God's grace. Which is bestowed on you through the Sacrament of Baptism.

It's through this power you discover your purpose and create your poetry. We see this in the scene where Jesus enters the Jordan river to be baptized by John.

Jesus does not need to be baptized. But he willingly enters into it to 1.) fulfill the Old Testament and 2.) perfect the nature of baptism. The moment of His baptism, God reveals to Jesus, and to all, the truth of His identity.

And a voice came from heaven, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased." (Mark 1:11)

(Emphasis mine.)

Of the three synoptic Gospels, Luke and Mark's perspective have a more personal touch. Matthew 1:17 says, "this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased."

Mark and Luke say, "YOU are my beloved son."

The truth of this identity puts Jesus' mission, His purpose, into motion. Ending with His poetry: Jesus voluntarily entering into suffering, taking hold of His wounds––His passion, death, and resurrection––and reconciling man back to God the Father.

Jesus is correcting where Adam failed. Jesus is the NEW Adam. Where Adam fails to take ownership and lead his bride, Jesus excels and leads His bride, which is His Church and all of humanity.

This is a blueprint for us to live our life by––and it's a 100% free gift to you and I.

But you and I have a choice. Answer the call to the journey or hide. Either way we will enter the katabasis of our life voluntarily or by tragedy (More on "katabasis" in the book).

Remember, there's not such thing as I don't have time. The reality is, you don't care enough to take action.

The Path of Contemplation and Atonement is your desert journey to encounter Jesus and discover the truth of your identity. So you can discover your purpose and bring your greatest gift, your "labor of love," to the world.

A gift worth suffering for.

Appreciate you reading,

hec g.

Btw...

Each path we choose in life has it's own sedation mechanisms. The Depressed Path: alcohol, drugs, porn, and food "free us" from the pain of our reality. The Path of Ascension: work, exercise, and building a career "free us" of the relationship and responsibility to the wound.

The Path of Ownership: absolutely frees us from the path of passivity in order to take hold of the wound, to bring our gifts to the world.

The Path of Contemplation and Atonement: absolutely frees us from pleasure, pride, and possessions. It's the ability to die to ourselves so we may truly live for Christ and serve those entrusted to our care.

It's where you think about the life of Jesus, develop your philosophy of life (I.e., your values), and order the elements of your life to truth.

This is the "S***-P****** Life."

The antithesis to the Soul-Chasing Life.

I'll expand on this in the next post to close out this "Rage Series."

[To be continued...]