Saint Ignatius, offers a number of practical tips to reflection, and the above is partially influenced by his Spiritual Exercises. One tool that he has made is that of the Examen, or the Examination of Conscious. This exercise is meant to be practised daily. It is a structured way of reflecting on your day, centred around integral parts of living our lives.
While it is slightly different to the reflections that will be offered in the rest of this book, the examen can be used to better understand how we can approach reflection. Therefore, I suggest going through it, and even spending five or ten minutes pondering the different points of the examen.
Examen
In the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius, the Examen is a five step process.
- Ask for a deeper understanding of your day and your actions, to look back on what happened through a clear lens.
- Give thanks.
- Review what has happened throughout your day.
- Accept and realise your shortcomings
- Turn to the coming day and see how I can better live it.
I will go through each one to open up how they can be used to reflect in your day to day life.
Step One
The first step is to ask for a deeper understanding of our day. Often, when trying to reflect, we rush into our thoughts and become consumed by them. By starting our time of reflection with a pause, asking for a more profound understanding of what we are going to next consider, we enable ourselves to consider things in a different way than we usually would.
Take a deep breath, if it helps, close your eyes. Automatically, bringing to mind the things you will do in the following steps will yield a reaction. Distance yourself from your internal biases and try to view them in a clear way.
Step Two
How often does a day go by with us thinking that it was a complete waste? How often do we focus on the things that went wrong? In this time, look back at your day with a positive lens. What are the things to be thankful for?
When recalling such things, we can tend to focus on specific aspects. Either we bring to mind the essential things in our lives that are often taken for granted; having food to eat, not being worried about a place to sleep, having a safe home environment.
Otherwise, we can go to the things we have striven for, which we should also be grateful for; having a job, recent successes, having attained an education.
Both these categories of gratitude are important.
Yet hidden away from our appreciation, there are often experiences that we do not look at fondly. A bad memory, a struggle in life, sickness, failure. There are hurts in which we are unable to find anything to be grateful for; that is okay. Life contains suffering we cannot understand.
There are also often two sides to bad experiences, which we can only comprehend if we are open to them. Sometimes, a failure leads us to grow, to realise that our life needs to change. Sickness might help us appreciate those around us. If it is not too painful, consider these experiences from a different lens. Search for something within the trial that you are grateful for.
Step Three
Go through the various episodes of your day. From the most mundane, to the exciting, consider them and see the extensive elements at play. Your actions, those made by the people around you.
What have you noticed? What are the things you give importance to?
Step Four
We can easily ignore the consequences of our actions by shifting the blame. Rather than focusing on what others have done wrong, turn inwards and see what you could have done better.
Whether they be big or small, everyone makes mistakes. Instead of hiding from our faults, bring them to mind. Have I hurt someone through my words? Have I been judgemental? Could I have helped someone in need, but did not out of laziness? Have I acted in a way that was not loving towards those around me?
It is important to be truthful to ourselves, yet we must also realise that what has happened has happened. Do not linger on your failures and mistakes. Accept them; they are a reality, and see how you can become better from them.
Step Five
Having reflected upon our day, we can now better notice how to better live the next one. Make conscious, tangible decisions on how to do so. See what you can improve, how you can live a more loving life.
If it helps, write down the things you want to set out to do.
Reflections 