Out of Egypt:

a good but difficult realization

I used to be an existentialist of sorts, believing the self was unknowable except in act, but now I realize that is a cop-out. I have habits and traits just like everyone else, and just because I am myself doesn't mean that I can't know them. It may make things more difficult, but it doesn't make them impossible.

All glorious rhetoric to the contrary, we do not recreate ourselves each day. There is a weight of habit that must be overcome; a "body of death" to be laid to rest. And I am need of anything that can help me to get a better handle on what that burden is for me.

The beginning of faith is not the end of our struggle - only when one is alive, and awake, to the war "within one's members" does one begin the battle. But God's strength is made perfect in our weakness.