Just This: Prompts and Practices for Contemplation

by Richard Rohr

what you resist persists When I first entered the Franciscan novitiate in 1961, part of our training was to learn to avoid, resist, and oppose all distractions. But it was a fruitless and futile effort because, if you start with negative energy, a “don’t,” you will not get very far (see Romans 7:7–11). There is always inner pushback. You know the old shibboleth, “Don’t think of an elephant.” If you try not to, that dang elephant will invariably sneak back into your mind! Just wait. To actively oppose something is actually to engage with it and to give it energy. That’s why good spiritual teachers say, “What you resist persists.” If you’re honest, that’s why trying to “resist distractions and think of God” is largely impossible. It has, in fact, led many to conclude that they can never learn how to pray! Many of my fellow friars left over the years, thinking they were inherently unspiritual because they could not think of God all day. (How do you “think” of God, anyway?) You can, however, think positively, gratefully, and with wonder and praise.13 Your first energy has to be “yes” energy, and from there you can move, build, and proceed. You must choose the positive and rest there for a minimum of fifteen conscious seconds—it takes that long for positivity to imprint in the neurons, I am told.