Four Hundred Texts on Love (Second Century) 15

43. As long as you have bad habits do not reject hardship, so that through it you may be humbled and eject your pride.

Think about this text for a while. How many of us truly change when we are comfortable and life is good? Nobody likes hardship. I’ve had an interesting life myself. I’ve never enjoyed the more difficult aspects of it, but for good or ill they have played a significant role in shaping me into the person I am today. We change and we grow under duress in ways that we do not when we are at our ease. When stressed we will change. I’m not sure that can be avoided. We can, however, shape the direction of our change. Will it be for good? Or for ill? There are human beings who face hardship and become villains. There are others who face trials just as bad or even worse and become saints. Most of us muddle through somewhere in between.

We do need to learn to rely on God and to base our character on him. But that is something that is much, much easier said than done.