Recollection - A time of Quiet and Healing

A Reflection that may lead you to improve the quality of your life!

A Recollection is a term commonly used in the Catholic Christian Tradition when Religious (Priest, Nuns, Brothers) take time for a day, a week end, a week or even a month, to be silent, pray and reflect on how their interior life is going on. Today in the Corporate world too, some attempt is being made to give employees the advantage of silence, meditation, reflection etc. Another common term interchangeable with Recollection, is Retreat. It literally means exactly that, to go back in time and become aware of where one could make changes to improve the quality of his or her life.

When is a Recollection or Retreat called for!

Perhaps I am lonely, sad, depressed. Or I have just gone through a stressful experience, like the death of a loved one, a loss of a job, maybe a painful separation or divorce. There are numerous situations in life in which I might find myself where life is becoming overwhelming and I am fast losing perspective and control of myself.

So what can I do?

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A Recollection is to recollect memories, to recall memories, to remember. And as we remember, we literally  re–member, that is put together, as different from dis - member. A dis-membering is a breaking up, a scattering, while re-membering is a bringing together, from fragmented to unifying.  To experience a wholeness, a rebirth, a GESTALT!

As days and weeks and months pass, we get involved. We want to give the best of ourselves, we reach out, work hard. Soon we forget ourselves, get lost in the events of each day. We are no more in control. We get depleted, tired, worn out, lonely, irritable and a part of us begins to withdraw. Soon we get isolated. From family, friends, companions, people and quite likely from God. We soon begin to look at life around us in an aggressive way. Finding fault, criticizing, judging people and their performance.

Loneliness sets in. This is a critical juncture in ones life. The resultant behaviours might lead to unsavoury company, drinking, smoking, drugs, extra marital sex and a variety of behaviours that might take one spiraling down the drain.  It’s time to find an oasis, to soothe our thirst, to rest our head, to be alone, to recall, to remember, to recollect. Find a reliable friend a confidante or even a counselor with whom one can open up and share.

So what do I do in such a situation?

Here is a line of reflection you could follow:

1.    My past, my background, my up bringing defines my present, my future.

a.    Do I understand this? What is the baggage from the past that I am carrying? Am I carrying resentments, prejudices, pains, angers, hurts or whatever from my past?

b.    Did I grow up in abject poverty? Did I grow up in a dysfunctional family?

c.    Did one or both parents die when I was a child? Did I experience divorce between my parents? Did either of my parents abandon me as a child?

d.    I cannot really enumerate all the events that may contribute to my present day situation. But I hope you get the idea. The answers to your present day situation will most certainly be found in your early or recent past.

e.    A word of caution: Your Ego or Pride will do its utmost to convince you that your problem does not lie in your past but in those around you:- Your Spouse, your Boss, your Mother-in-law, the markets, spiraling prices, the devil and even God. If you believe this, then you are helpless and become a victim!

f.     Instead take responsibility. Be willing to own your past. This does not mean you are to blame. This only mean that you are willing to look into your life, that you are willing to use your ability to RESPOND rather than REACT to a situation.

g.    We react because we are frightened. We DO NOT SEEM TO HAVE CHOICES. To respond, to heal, we must have resources. We ALL possess these resources. Unfortunately, our upbringing has convinced us that we don’t have resources, and thefore must depend on others. (Parents, relatives, teachers, etc.) The more I understand that I am enough! That I have every thing I possibly need to live a humane and effective life, the more free, joyful and successful will I be.

2.    As you pass this stage of resolving issues from your past, you could gently move on to the second stage.

A stage of Meaningful quality in your life.

1.    Do you have a purpose in life! Why were you born!

a.    Consider this: Your purpose in life is to know who you are:-

                                          i.    Are you your Body? Your mind? Your Education? Your degrees?

                                        ii.    Are you your heritage, your family, your background? Your caste? Your creed? Your religion?

                                       iii.    Are you your wealth, your possessions? Money? Land?

                                       iv.    What about the position you hold? Your achievements? Your Degrees? Your awards?

                                        v.    Father, Mother, Son, Daughter, Husband, Wife, you name it?

b.    All this will pass away! So WHO indeed are you?

c.    Perhaps the following Consideration will help you: The only thing that does not change, you came with it, and will go with it when everything else has disintegrated: Call it Spirit – Soul – Atman.

d.    You never were born – you always existed – when this so called sojourn on Earth began, you were given a body, but you always existed, and this body will one day disintegrate, but you will live – as spirit as you were before. With the Christian tradition of my faith, I believe I came from God (Divine – Pure Spirit), I live in God, I will go back to God.

e.    But maybe not exactly as before – you will have now a deeper consciousness of who you. And I would dare to suggest, you will have a Divine Consciousness.

f.     I would believe, we are all part of the Divine, and our purpose in life, is not only to become aware of this Divine Consciousness, but to share it with all of creation around me, thus creating a world of Love, Peace and Joy.

g.    I come from God! I live in God! I will go Back to God.