Penance Practices to Follow

for the upcoming “The Modern Monastic”

It is wise to induce artificial poverty in your lifestyle as a monk to induce a state of mind characterized by humility. It is a rather comical practice I employ. I came from a comfortable even luxurious American middle-class background in childhood. We did suffer and do without new things and comforts. No expensive gifts from Daddy. There was very little real jewelry hurried but still there was no regard for the poor or humility of spirit. To reach God we must be broken.

I have found this way to be broken, which is at times quite comical in that it is a technique of sabotage which was not totally my own choosing. I lost my little car due to the auction after this strike of the Covid 19 pandemic in 2020. I run out of bus money late in the month because the federal government reduced my Social Security direct deposit to the point where I cannot do all my desirable hobbies or buy everything I need in printing. So as a result, I cannot get to my storage space only 4 miles away.

Things were put into self-storage because of fear as I live in a hostile corrupt management system of janitors and receptionist who steal for a living and pleasure. I believe this team has finally been fired by the landlord. Years I’ve taken place where malicious mischief and Pilfering have occurred in my treasure home items such as a Viti pure water dispenser. At any rate I am worried about my art collection myself from I rented a 5 by 15 space at Smart Shop of Henrietta.

Without a car but with the purchase of a large rolling cart for shopping made of canvas and aluminum I have become a soldier on the bus system traveling back and forth for 50 cents one way with loads of suitcases, cartons and books to place into my storage space far away. How humiliating it has been to do this at all! I get a lot of looks from the poor on the bus and irritation from drivers which I must endure to accomplish when I must. This is part of the new pennants practice to make me aware of the poor and to love them better

My 15-piece cookware set brand new gold beautiful stored there I need to get back for two weeks. They put it there out of fear of theft. Numbered the parts with the marker expecting one or two to be pinched. This extravagant Christmas gift will eventually become part of my kitchen again would not just yet. I teach myself humility by having placed it out of reach though brand new. This sounds like stupidity but in fact besides the comedy it is making me feel poverty artificially I turn mean true to my vow made to be a nun and live cheaply

Is this wise practice? As I continue having locked my purse in this wall safe had forgotten what combination I changed it to this past week I have been forced to deal with the lack of a bank card or small change I am accustomed to spending. I can’t visit the 5 and 10 for little items such as toiletries. I cannot even use the debit card to check my current balance at Chase! I feel like a total fool, and this is good for my ego. My checking only contains $3 and has been like that for two weeks. Many ingenious things have been done to enable me to live in comforts I’m accustomed to this month. For example, I have had to fabricate dishwashing solution from a bottle of body wash in the shower which is the same sort of mild soap.

Who is the week left to receive my direct deposit from Social Security I am already out of milk eggs and bread as well as butter. This artificial poverty has made me cleverer in substituting things like ground chickpea hummus made at home or crackers.

The expensive $120 a month payment for self-storage unit to 126 will have to vanish I avail by February 3 if only I could have reached it at the beginning of December before the 7^th and emptied the dam space I could have conserved that fee. I improvised some weapons at home so that no one could pilfer me. Thieves like mosquitoes and their incessant burglaries have taught me humility and tolerance of others. Of a deeper understanding in the Rochester News when I read or hear about the strings of car thefts from in front of churches as the faithful attend Mass this Christmas.

Due to my poverty and desperation to do the Wash I have had to humble myself to ask my neighbors like John for small loans of money. I owe the old lady $2 for that purpose which I must pay back in January. I was starving yesterday at the hospital library because I had no funds to purchase lunch. I ended up begging $8 from a young lady who was Muslim. That really taught me a lot! I am a much better person now because I stooped to doing that.

Although traveling around with a wooden bowl too big food daily is a feature of the monastic practice of Buddhist monks in the east I don’t approve and cringe at the thought in America of doing that. I have instead substituted occasionally Participating in the weekly charity table here in our community room at Plymouth Gardens. This features backs of old stale bread left for free taking. Still for me this is humiliating to have to stoop this low. I am even scared of the resentment of the store and sometimes fear that they have poisoned the rolls. That is sometimes typical when you are poor in Rochester, NY. Having been forced to rely on the charity of Wegmans and the weekly Friday curbside food link fruit and vegetable discount truck have been wonderful means to end my swelled head for good.

In close I will just add that due to my lifestyle I have few kin or friends who have sufficient worth to support me with a gift of a check even for my birthday. This left knit no longer exists for me as a poor senior citizen and I welcome it in aiding the keeping of my poverty monastic vow. It is laughable to have lived like this in 2024, but it has proven a wise course of action. I have curbed in my arrogant persona. On buses, I notice my fellow travelers often and have started to offer aid as a new habit.

Of course, simply restricting yourself to about $1300 income per month overall is the chief way to establish a poverty line in your choice of residence type or cut of meat. Getting a paid haircut for a woman is torture at $23 fee. Searching for a “freebie” can take days of humbling frustration.

One grows much more aware of our callous American society.

This place will have a new guidance counselor, so a comedian named John Belushi or a relative of his. He is a former friend.  With this man here, the black tenants will r relax more and chuckle over their plight. They are forced to wear plastic sandals all year round because they can’t afford sneakers in winter.  It is jail practice.  They don’t need this lesson in poverty—but I do.  It was wonderful in August when a criminal team at Storquest Long Beach stole my suitcase containing, among other things, two pairs of new JC Pennys boots and shoes. I was mad for weeks. This forced me to accept a found pair of used boots left downstairs for grabs.  Such a penalty of poverty has improved my likelihood of gaining Heaven.

This is more desirable to me in the long run:  to be with my best friend the blessed Savior Jesus Christ, my beloved Messiah, at the end of the tortured, high narrow pathed climb before too long.