You may know Martin better from his two recent books, The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life<\/a> Much of this short book (89 pages, plus) is a review of the life and writings of Thomas Merton and Henri Nouwen centering on the idea of, as the title tell you,\u00a0Becoming Who You Are.<\/em><\/p>\n Martin explains by citing Merton from New Seeds of Contemplation<\/a><\/em>:<\/p>\n For me to be a saint means to be myself,\u2026Therefore the problem of sanctity and\u00a0salvation\u00a0is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and discvoering my true self\u201d <\/em>(p. ix).<\/p>\n These might be off-putting, even scary, words for those raised in a Christian faith where \u201cwe\u201d are\u00a0the\u00a0problem that needs fixing. I mean, Jesus even said you have to lose your life if you want to find it.<\/p>\n But Merton is in fact saying just that. Note Merton speaks of \u201cdiscovering my true self.<\/em>\u201d The true self is \u201cthe person we are before God and the person we are meant to be\u201d (p. 18). The false self, by contrast, is \u201cthe person that we wish to present to the world, and the person we want the whole world to revolve around\u201d (p. 19)<\/p>\n Martin cites Merton, again from New Seeds of Contemplation<\/em>:<\/p>\n Thus I use up my life in the desire for pleasures and the thirst for\u00a0experiences\u00a0 for power, honor, knowledge and love, to clothe this false self and\u00a0construct its nothingness into something objectively real. And I wind\u00a0experiences\u00a0around myself and cover\u00a0myself\u00a0with pleasures and glory\u00a0like\u00a0bandages in order to make myself\u00a0perceptible\u00a0to myself and to the world, as if I were an\u00a0invisible\u00a0body\u00a0that\u00a0could only become visible when something visible\u00a0covered\u00a0its surface <\/em>(p. 19).<\/p>\n I understand some might be tempted to think this is self-help psychobabble, but nothing could be further from the truth. \u00a0True knowledge of oneself, and the process of\u00a0transforming\u00a0beyond the false self, is a lifelong, arduous process.<\/p>\n It takes courage to look deep inside ourselves and ask, \u201cHow well do I know myself? How bound am I to a life I have\u00a0constructed\u00a0for myself that on the surface has all the trappings of piety and faith, but in truth is rooted in jealousy, anger, fear, power, self-justification, control, and the like?\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/peteenns.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/becoming-who-you-are-1.jpeg?ssl=1\" "\\"becoming")
<\/a>A few years ago, I was given a short book written by James Martin, SJ,\u00a0Becoming Who You Are: Insights on the True Self from Thomas Merton and Other Saints<\/a>