Transforming the self

As a
motivational mentor I encounter people with many issues and these always divide
along the lines of the three core life elements: achievement, relationship, or
self growth. Paradoxically, sometimes the more the serious the issues, the
easier they are to support and help. People who are doing all the right things
sometimes cannot change, and therefore cannot transform their Self.

 There is a
wonderful story in the Sayings of the Desert Fathers about Abbot Lot: “Abbot
Lot came to Abbot Joseph and said, ‘Father, to the limit of my ability, I keep
my little rule, my little fast, my prayer, meditation and contemplative
silence; to the limit of my ability, I cleanse my heart of thoughts; what more
should I do?’ This question – what more should I do? – is relevant to us all in
our odyssey through life. And I am sure you can see how difficult it is to
answer, given the fact that Abbot Lot is already doing so much that is right.
Indeed, Abbot Lot specifically refers twice the ‘limit of his ability’ – he is
doing, in our language, the max!

 As mentors
and coaches, then, it is easy to see how to help or direct somebody who is all
at sea, who is not doing any of the basics in the three core life elements. But
how do we help the person who is dissatisfied by their progress when they are
sincerely doing the best that they can already?

 Let me
invite you now to reflect on what would your answer be to either Abbot Lot or
to one such client that you have experienced or might experience in future?
What would you say?

 What Abbot
Joseph said is revealing: “The elder man rose up in reply, and stretched out
his hands to heaven, and his fingers became like ten lamps of fire. He said,
‘Why not be utterly changed into fire?’”

 This
answer is instructive and brilliant on many levels. First, he “rose” – the
physical body changed in order to make his response. Second, the hands
addressed a power beyond and a small part of him changed further – the digits
of his hand. As a theological point the ten digits are burning in flame; what
may ten represent? The ten commandments – the law – the very thing that Abbot
Lot is consumed by following – all the right procedures, and protocols, and
‘laws’ that supposedly lead to heaven. Third, the all-consuming question – not
an answer – a suggestion almost: become fire!

 This is a
staggering suggestion: that at root we need to burn up the old life and become
something completely new, and wholly free, and incandescently bright. Exactly
how we reach that transformation is, of course, another question. But it must
surely begin for all of us, if we consider the real meaning of the story, with
the vision and the intention to be that flame.