It is depressing when medical people tell one to "be careful". I was hoping I could start living "normally" again, conscious of the backlog of work that has built up over the past few weeks, the bills that will soon be falling due, all the plans on hold while waiting for some little clots to disperse. Unfortunately, they haven't, so this curious kind of pottering existence must continue. It seems the antithesis of everything monastic, never to be still for more than a few minutes at a time, always having to think how to do whatever needs to be done and accepting that some things are currently not possible. Frustration!

The truth is that in my heart of hearts I rather despise the idea of "being careful". It is such a namby-pamby notion, not at all to my taste. St Benedict has an answer for that, of course. In chapter 33 he reminds us that as monks and nuns we do not have even our bodies and wills at our own disposal (RB 33.4). They are given to God and the community unreservedly. That is so contrary to modern ideas of self-sufficiency and self-fulfilment that it comes as something of a shock. Do I not have any rights in the matter? Well, no, you don't. Everything you do, even the lifestyle you adopt, has consequences for which you, and you alone, are responsible. You are, as it were, a steward of yourself and it is up to you to prove yourself a good steward.

That means, alas, that I'll have to do as I'm told and bear the anger and annoyance of those whose own plans will be affected by the scuppering of my own. My guilt feelings will probably head towards the stratosphere but I'm sure I'll learn something valuable. The skies won't fall in because I'm not there to hold them up; and possibly, just possibly, I'll learn that God's ideas are better than my own. Hope so.