Spiritual Victories

A victory of spirit always comes before any material victory.

Bojana Kovacevic Cited in Mystical Hours

Br. Teasdale gives us the background and explanation of this outlook in these words:

“Bojana Kovacevic was a student of mine at Columbia College in Chicago. Originally from Serbia, Bojana suffered through the war in her country, the death of her brother and her move to America. Her life has given her opportunities to grow in inner strength and to experience victories of spirit, which she described in a paper she wrote for my class.

Bojana described how success in education, career, family, recognition, and money are preceded by interior success. The disposition toward victory or a positive mental attitude, she wrote, must come before external triumphs.

For Bojana, it is a basic decision one makes, whether or not it is motivated by hardship and necessity or by a desire for a better life. Examine your own interior disposition and attitudes and ask yourself whether they are positive or negative.”

While I can generally and widely accept the importance of attitude towards one’s goals in life, I have been disturbed for some years about the whole “New Age” manifestation story/scheme where all one has to do is hold an idea or an image in mind to create its reality or to “manifest’ its appearance in your life!

For me, and for my halting and skeptical experience with this exercise, I have had little success. The proponents of this practice would say to me: Of course! You did not have a positive attitude that it was coming your way, and you did not persist in believing that you deserve or should expect it!

I have little doubt that one’s mindset does influence one’s success, and that initiative and enterprise, persistence, and perseverance do matter in the eventual attainment of any goal-spiritual or material! However, the practice of just holding something in your mind as an idea without sufficient, focussed attention and vigorous application of skills and knowledge, sounds like a naive assumption and a mental trick…at best!

What I am willing to support when it comes to setting a positive attitude is this: God gives us what we expect to receive from God. Not in the mere rewards of materialism, unless it is truly a definite need, but our covenant with God is one of mutuality, respect, interactive compassion, and an acceptance of grace that arrives at the doorstep of an unconditional heartfelt love.