Lord, what do you want me to do?

-

 Phenomenology may lead towards social/self-therapy but should not lead to nihilism or endless skepticism. (Carl Rogers developed client-centered therapy after phenomenology.)

I was restudying mystical theology and instead of AI fascination leading into hoarding information, it might be better to trust the Lord because my mind has a limited capacity. Mysticism reminded me that negative theology is the only possible thing a human being can think about God without the help of Divine revelation. With God's revelation though, we are still limited as to the Infinity of God's nature.

So what happened? I was lead by the Spirit to pray, "Lord, what do you want me to do?" This has the notion of asking the Lord for the specific will of Him for your specific situation right there and then and for your specific concerns or present problems or about the future. But unlike phenomenology which may lead to self-centered concerns without social concerns, the specific prayer asking God what He wants you to do is asking for what is pleasing in His sight, which encompass all--the self, others, and God. We may not know the Infinity of God, but asking specifically what He wants us to do is inviting the Infinite to incarnate into our very being. And then do it. The saints have told us that it is of no use to ask what God wants us to do without any desire for doing it.

We are longing for God. That is the reason why we are asking Him, which only God can fill. Phenomenology though tending to individual concerns are not a kind of prayer. It may lead us towards the idea of what is good specifically for us. But does God who sees everything really wants that particular good for us? Praying then that line, "Lord, what do you want me to do?" needs to use the discernment of the Spirit, where he is leading us towards, which good invites us, gives us peace, is comforting us. Spirituality is the completion of phenomenology, if we won't give in to the temptation of despair seeing only our own weaknesses and evil acts.

Don't be afraid to pray then, "Lord, what do you want me to do?" Trust that God will illuminate our very limited views and lead us towards full communion with Him. Amen.

That said here is a crash differentiation of phenomenology to other disciplines since it only includes what I had in mind and not all. Anyways you will still have the idea that phenomenology is different. Below is from ChatGPT-4o, 6 August 2025:

n.b. All throughout my write up I will reflect phenomenologically about the question "Lord, what must I do with my life?" But it's not just a question but a prayer. Let no one think in any way that such a prayer, or similar short supplications to God, is an invalid form of prayer, because praying is first and foremost a supernatural act directed to God who understands the deepest longings of our hearts more than words can tell.

« Previous Chapter | Table of Contents | Next Chapter »

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Conclusion

-
Image
 I started phenomenologizing about my career choice but ended up praying. What happened? Recall me as a catholic who cannot bracket out my faith because it is a fundamental part of my being. It is also not helpful if we go on the other side of the linear equation, positing there is no God, and do phenomenologizing atheistically. We have lots of proof you can review why it isn't the road we took for such things as personal as my life career choice. We didn't focus on proving the existence of God though. There are lots of better proofs out there. We merely focused on doing phenomenology and my chosen topic, which is my career choices. If I phenomenologized during the boom of television, my career would also reflect on its effect. But I reflected today wherewith AI is affecting how I work. I used AI to simplify my complex ideas about my own career choices, which is like using a calculator to help me understand and situate those things that are bothering me about my career. Like ve...
Read more

Practical Thinking

-
 Would you believe that practical thinking is ethical thinking? "What path will I choose to achieve the end? Or what means will I use to achieve my goal?" "What should I do," is a practical question. But "What should I do with my life," is already half practical and half theoretical. It can include ethical philosophy already. Now extending it, the question "Lord, what should I do with my life?" becomes a prayer, a summon for help since we know by experience that the situation that is in front of us, is beyond our capacity to solve. We know by experience if something we need to solve is within our capacity by way of skill, knowledge, or accumulated experiences. We also know if its beyond our capacity to solve. We give thanks God that we have a banana to eat--we don't commonly ask God for help in eating the banana.🤣 I asked an AI and I actually learned a lot about my situation, why it's different from other's experiences, why it seems ...
Read more

Artificial Intelligence

-
Image
 You are also a model maker you may not yet realize though. The model out there for the taking is 20-20-20 rule for avoiding gadget glares and its consequences that for every 20 minute use of gadget with glares, you stop for 20 seconds and look 20 feet away. Then you observed it and acted on it. However, through trial and error you noticed that when you have migraine or is about to onset, 20 minutes is too long, and the 20 second time out is too short, and that 20 feet looking away is abrupt for you that you observed that you still look blank or blurred before you look and observe something 20 feet away. Perhaps you're still in your thought and can't observe things right away. You observe too that its better to stop, look away, and think about what you're reading for example without any timer which is more at pace with your thinking processes. The additional problem that you noticed though is that you tend to bypass the 20 minute focus when you don't have migraine and s...
Read more