Words for Quiet Moments

Only in middle adulthood did I begin to approach what Jean Leclerq would call " an asceticism of humor," It involves the most difficult self denial of all: you no longer take yourself too seriously. The days and nights no longer rotate around you, your heartache and your hiatal hernia, your problems and frustrations. You see yourself in perspective, as you really are, a creature wonderfully yet fearfully made, a bundle of paradoxes and contradictions. In brief, you can laugh at yourself and put your trust in Another. "Walter Burghardt, SJ."