A Word on Perseverance

Lately, everywhere I turn I have encountered people who are dealing with fatigue. Definition: Extreme tiredness resulting from mental or physical exertion or illness. Even as I write this, I sense myself emotionally attached to the burdens of my peers. I have noticed a couple of things about those who are dealing with fatigue, and I have sensed it in my spirit that many have yielded to these practices.

 

One: I have noticed that some of those who are dealing with fatigue are giving up. They are throwing in the towel. It’s not even a compromise, it’s more about that they just don’t care anymore about what happens. And as a result, the lack of awareness is manifesting both in themselves and in their practice of precaution.

 

Second, I am noticing those who are still trying, and are making continuous efforts to keep afloat, to show up to work, and to practice safety. But because of the fatigue, something’s getting through the cracks. Maybe not the COVID-19 virus, but nevertheless, some kind of virus still. Whether it’s mental stress that’s causing sleepless nights, short responses, and frustration; emotional overload that’s causing numbness to the environment and to self; or destitute morality which is causing binge drinking or inappropriate behaviors. Ultimately, there is a very strong temptation to give up.

 

I’ve hardly seen the third action. The third action is one that calls for perseverance. Definition: Persistence in doing something despite difficulty or delay in achieving success. This third action of perseverance calls for a reaching into the deep part of our soul, and to pull out something we didn’t even know exists. This is a strength that has been untapped, an emotion that has been foreign to us, a mindset that we’ve been blind to. And the reason is because perseverance calls for strength in the midst of oppression. It calls for movement when we can’t move no more. It was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said, “All too many people attempt to face the tensions of life with inadequate spiritual resources.”

 

Dr. King goes on to say that for perseverance to have its completion, there must be a two-fold approach. One: Acknowledge the true basis of our fears. And two: Learn to apply courage to deface them.

 

At this point, I would like to quote Dr. King at length:

 

“Realizing that fear drains a man’s energy and depletes his resources, Emerson wrote, ‘He has not learned the lesson of life who does not everyday surmount a fear.’ But I do not mean to suggest that we should seek to remove fear altogether from human life. Were this humanly possible, it would be practically undesirable. Fear is the elemental alarm system of the human organism, which warns of approaching dangers, and without which man could not have survived in either the primitive or modern worlds. Fear, moreover, is a powerfully creative force. Every great invention and intellectual advance represents the desire to escape from some dreadful circumstance or condition. The fear of darkness led to the discovery of the secret of electricity. The fear of pain lead to the marvelous advances of medical sciences. The fear of ignorance was one reason that man built great institutions of learning. The fear of war was one of the forces behind the birth of the United Nations. Angelo Patri has rightly said, ‘Education consists of being afraid at the right time.’ If man were to lose his capacity to fear, he would be depraved of his capacity to grow, invent, and create. So in a sense, fear is normal, necessary, and creative. But we must remember that abnormal fears are emotionally ruinous and psychologically destructive. It is to such fears that we usually refer when we speak of getting rid of fear. Normal fears protect us; abnormal fear paralyzes us. Normal fear motivates us to improve our individual and collective welfare; abnormal fear constantly poisons and distorts our inner lives. Our problem is not to be rid of fear, but rather to harness and master it. First, we must unflinchingly face our fears and honestly ask ourselves why we are afraid. This confrontation will, to some measure grant us power. We should never be cured of fear by escapism or repression, for the more we attempt to ignore and repress our fears, the more we multiply our inner conflicts. Second, we can master fear through one of the supreme virtues known to man: Courage. Thomas Aquinas said that courage is the strength of mind capable of conquering whatever threatens the attainment of the highest good. Courage, therefore, is the power of the mind to overcome fear. Unlike anxiety, fear has a definite object which may be faced, analyzed, attacked, and, if need be, endured. Courage takes the fear produced by a definite object into itself and thereby conquers the fear involved. Paul Tillich has written, ‘Courage is self-affirmation “in spite of” … that which leads to hinder the self from affirming itself.’ This courage self-affirmation, which is surely a remedy for fear, is not selfishness, for self-affirmation includes both a proper self-love and a properly propositioned love of others. Courage, the determination not to be overwhelmed by any object, however frightful, enables us to stand up to any fear. Trouble is a reality in this strange medley of life, dangers lurk within the circumference of every action, accidents do occur, bad health is an ever-threatening possibility, and death is a stark, grim, and inevitable fact of human experience. Evil and pain in this conundrum of life are close to each of us, and we do both ourselves and our neighbors a great disservice when we attempt to prove that there is nothing in this world of which we should be frightened. These forces that threaten to negate life must be challenged by courage, which is the power of life to affirm itself in spite of life’s ambiguities. This requires the exercise of a creative will that enables us to hue out a stone of hope from a mountain of despair.”

 

I will now jump to Dr. King’s fourth point. “Fourth, fear is mastered by faith. A common source of fear is an awareness of deficient resources and of a consequent inadequacy for life. All too many people attempt to face the tensions of life with inadequate spiritual resources. Our trouble is simply that we attempt to confront fear without faith. We sail through the stormy seas of life without adequate spiritual boats. Abnormal fears and phobias that are expressed in neurotic anxiety may be cured by psychiatry, but the fear of death, nonbeing, and nothingness, expressed in existential anxiety, may be cured only by a positive religious faith. A positive religious faith does not offer an illusion that we should be exempt from pain and suffering, nor does it imbue us with the idea that life is a drama of unalloyed comfort and untroubled ease. Rather, it instills us with the inner equilibrium, needed to face strains, burdens, and fears that inevitably come, and assures us that the universe is trustworthy and that God is concerned. Religion endows us with the conviction that we are not alone in this vast, uncertain universe. Beneath and above the shifting sands of time, the uncertainties that darken our days, and the vicissitudes that cloud our nights is a wise and loving God. This universe is not a tragic expression of meaningless chaos, but a marvelous display of orderly cosmos – ‘The Lord by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens.’ The confidence that God is mindful of the individual is of tremendous value in dealing with the disease of fear, for it gives us a sense of worth, of belonging, and of at-homeness in the universe.”

 

So we see that perseverance is not what many assume it to be, white-knuckling our way through life’s hard situations and circumstances. Perseverance involves an intellectual understanding of our circumstances by identifying mentally, emotionally, and morally how we function under the oppressions of life.

 

When I stop to listen to my peers, I know that most of their expression is emotionally manifested. But I process that for my peers to encounter an emotional frustration, there had to begin a mental disturbance.

 

I know it’s painful. I feel your hurt. And I am with you in this race, my brother, my sister, my friend. You are not alone. Not only because many are riding the same wave with you, but more so because God determines how far the wave goes into the shores of land, whether the wave causes damage or it brings pleasure, and whether the wave washes up something in our lives, or makes something stronger. You see, for perseverance to take its adequate course, there must be pressure. There must be tension. There must be stress. And for us to practice proper perseverance, there must be understanding, not only of what’s going on, but also an understanding intellectually, emotionally, and morally of how to endure it.

 

YOU ARE NOT ALONE. Dr. King said that in this vast universe there is Almighty God, sitting on his throne, keeping watch over his own. My encouragement to you is to find what it means to be at home with God in the midst of the storms of this world.

 

God bless you my brother. God bless you my sister.

 

Sincerely yours,

Chaplain Rigo.

 

P.S. This song is dedicated to all of you, learning to persevere in the storm.