Understanding Our Restless Selves

Retirement offers me the gift of being able to ask daily: How do I want to spend my day? This is a luxury I haven't had since I was five, since before starting school! An opportunity not to be wasted!

In her book on the "search for a life of passion, purpose, and joy" (entitled Following the Path), Joan Chittister writes: "what we are meant to do in life never really stops biting at our heels. Our unfinished selves never stop calling to us...

"People start to search out what they're most interested in as children... It may take years for the heart to find the soul of itself, to know what that really is, but it will happen. Someday... People begin to paint when they are eighty...

"We are what we are, but the gift of self unfolds only as we go... It can take years before it becomes clear - the real gift that is hidden within us... 

"Developing the honesty it takes to unmask the self to the self is no small task..."