I've probably said this a thousand times, but it amazes me how much even though I say I love Him and I want to do His will always, that I am so good at avoiding actually spending time with Him. Even when I'm praying I often just recite words in the hope that I can avoid being still with Him. He says be with me, I love you, and I rattle off Hail Marys as if that will get me off the hook, as if I won't have to spend time with him or as if that counts as me spending time with Him. Jesus told me once that I would be able to hear him again after going to confession and I thought that meant that when my heart was heavy with sin, that he would stop talking or that I would somehow just not be able to hear him. But that's not the way it works. He's always talking and if I want to I can always hear him. When my heart is heavy it's not God who creates the distance. It's me. When I haven't been to confession for a while,  I don't want to hear Him because I'm afraid of what He might say. and I pretend that I'm afraid because He'll be mad, because I'm afraid of some horrible punishment. But really I'm afraid of exactly the opposite. I'm afraid that he won't push me away, that he won't punish me, that his command will be the same as always: to simply be still, to be with him. and in those moments I think I know why the ancient Israelites were so afraid to look at the face of God, because his light washes everything else away, and I so often don't want to let go of everything else. So I run and I hide forgetting that nothing is hidden from him. I often think that all those things I'm holding on to are me, but the truth is that only when all of these things are stripped away am I able to see myself, and to do that, to know myself, I have to stop running; I have to be still, to be with him and allow him to love me.

I'm praying for you!

:)