This book is said to be written by a monk for monks. So, it talks about things that a normal human being like me, or probably like most of us who read for pleasure, hard to implement. Common, who among us can abandon our comfortable lives, pack another pair of clothes and join a religious organization just like what St. Francis of Assisi, Beatified Mother Teresa or the disciples of Jesus? For me they are the super-humans who are different from all of us.

I will never claim that I am religious and that I always doubt that if I die now, I will go straight to heaven. Why? Because one thing that I find hard to do or will never ever do is to abandon what comforts I am enjoying now like living away from my wife and daughter and join the monks to pray and serve my fellowmen. I mean, what will happen to my wife and daughter? Especially my daughter who is still studying? She still needs my support and I have a responsibility to her as her father. Jesus said in Mark 20:25 that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for someone rich to enter the kingdom of God. And since it was Jesus who said that that basically is what the first part of The Imitation of Christ, "Helpful Counsels of the Spiritual Life" is all about. Well, aside from the importance of solitude and silence that I always find to have especially during the early mornings when I wake up to urinate and I could not sleep, I grab the rosary in my side of the bed and pray.

The second book "Directives for Inner Life" tells us that we are all passers-by in this world and that being passers-by, we should attribute everything to God. We should take up our cross just like the way Jesus did. If it is work that we consider us our cross, we should work hard and dedicate everything we do in the office to Him rather than to our boss. Everything is fleeting and ephemeral. Everything will pass. Your boss, who does not see your hard work and who is focused on himself or his own agenda will also pass. The job that you think you need will also pass and you will move on. Everything happens for a reason and the important thing is that you live your life based on what God has designed for you. We should open our hearts and accept him. However, again, that is easier said than done. Again, read Mark 20:25.

The third book is my favorite mot only because it is in the form of a dialogue between Jesus and one of his disciples but it can be summarized by one of my favorite biblical passages, John 14:16 that says "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Nothing else is important. If you boss scolds you, refuse to talk back and think of Jesus being the more important person than them (if they are wrong). What Jesus thinks of you is more important than what your boss thinks about you even if he thinks that you suck and you are deserved to be sacked. Don't worry, Jesus who sees the real you will show you the way.

The fourth and final book "On Blessed Sacrament" is also in the form of dialogue just like the third book but it is focused more on the sacraments as the practices that should remind us of Jesus Christ when he was still on earth like the holy mass and the sacred communion. It is through the sacraments that we can form union with Jesus and it is through following Him, through imitating Him that we can have share an eternal life with Him.