Interesting opportunities arise with new employment, the potential for a stellar career properly presenting itself. It will take two years, yet an hourly rate of thirty-three dollars is placed upon my plate. Humbly, through the eyes of a determined contemplative, I am impressed with the wonders of God. He delivers a mature discernment process. To pursue the path of a professional career as an engineering technician will demand a commitment on the level of a graduate student. My skills and experience are aligned, however further knowledge and precision detailing the specifics of the die casting world is demanded. The money will not be given to me. I will have to earn it. The new employer promotes a professional culture I am convinced I can thrive within. During this six month discernment process, I will apply myself full throttle forward in pursuit of the engineering tech position. The worldly position makes me long for a partner in life, not being emotional, yet convinced God is a creator of order. Man is at his best in the world when accompanied with the splendor of a woman. However in human application, the condition of husband and wife is complicated, and I am convinced rarely achieved to maximum efficiency. Still lesser efficiencies are vital to a man living in the world. Conditions at home, a wife and children, allow a man to prosper easier in the world. Simply through the fact of responsibility and accountability, it forces a man into maturity. He becomes a provider and protector, aspiring to the life St Joseph tendered for Mary and Jesus. That role in life, father and husband, itself is spiritually demanding, providing maturity. Through misadventures and adventures and absolutely centered in love, it is a path for a man to become whole in the eyes of God, even if that wholeness comes through humiliation, disappointments, pain, and unfulfilled dreams. Honestly is that not the reality of all spiritual paths for men. There is no path allowing a self-glorifying flowering parade of wonder toward God. It is toil and drudgery. And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth to you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” Within that realization, I consider the prospect of a wife, reflecting and depressed through personal experience. I lack comprehension regarding the knowledge of a supportive woman, one able to nurture and expand my horizons. The thought of a wife, one able to bring out my strengths, allowing worldly and spiritual expansion seems impossible. I ponder my past, understanding, rejecting remorse, praying for fertile soil for a new beginning, that the women of my life never possessed the ability to nurture my manhood in a Godly manner, I think of it in terms of a Catholic intent. I have been subjected not to evil, yet broken women forced through personal failings to impose undermining and domination as a means of caring for men. It all started with my mother. With no sorrow, within love, I recognize the fact. Concretizing self-knowledge, I know a disposition was firmly entrenched. Through my own failings and upbringings, I was never able to be a man able to present myself as a strong protector and provider, thus a woman owning a nurturing disposition able to produce manhood and maturity never appeared within my scope of vision. Alone, discerning the religious life or a professional life, I open myself to God, pleading in prayer to reveal realities. Lord, the worldly life being what it is, I humbly ask you to provide a woman who will see my strengths, believe in me as a good man of God and nurture me. I cannot take hurtful women anymore, those undermining and constantly throwing punches at my head–no more discomfort and pain from the women in my life. I know I am man enough, good in heart, loving you All-Mighty Lord with mind, body, and soul. Please Lord teach me what is good through the pursuit of excellence within my manhood, open my life to a woman of maturity in spirit, one exercising temperance in control and will-power, trusting in Your will through the bolstering of my pride and manhood, acquiescing to dominating in order to caress and fortify through womanly love. Through weakness true strength emerges, Lord I am weak, teach me to be strong, provide a woman who knows how to be weak.
The following was taken from the Our Lady of Mount Carmel parish bulletin. Driving with Mary after mass, she handed it to me and said read this it is good. It is a reflection upon strength and courage.
Strength vs Courage
It takes strength to be firm.
It takes courage to be gentle.
It takes strength to stand guard.
It takes courage to let down your guard.
It takes strength to conquer.
It takes courage to surrender.
It takes strength to be certain.
It takes courage to have doubt.
It takes strength to fit in.
It takes courage to stand out.
It takes strength to feel a friend’s pain.
It takes courage to feel your own pain.
It takes strength to hid your own pains.
It takes courage to show them.
It takes strength to endure abuse.
It takes courage to stop it.
It takes strength to stand alone.
It takes courage to lean on another.
It takes strength to love.
It takes courage to be loved.
It takes strength to survive.
It takes courage to LIVE! “
