Small Victory

The woman in the white veil has no idea how much she helped me.

I was sitting in a pew at Our Lady Victory Church at Pine and William streets in Manhattan one day last week trying to reassemble my brain.

I was recuperating from a brutal case of self-sabotage where I had done pretty much everything but ram my head into the nearest brick wall.

I’m not exactly sure what exactly set this particular disaster in motion—something to do with my computer at work, I think—but I remember getting frustrated and then I turned the anger on myself, bitterly regurgitating all my past missteps, mistakes, and missed opportunities.

I was so angry, so miserable, and so hard on myself that if this had been a prize fight, the referee would have stepped in and stopped the one-sided barrage immediately.

It was the exact opposite of the mindset I’ve been trying to cultivate for 2019--my Hey 19 effort--where I do everything I can to have the Greatest Year Ever.

Instead of thinking positively and efficiently, however, I wasn’t thinking at all—I was tearing myself to shreds, just like that nasty little subconscious saboteur in my skull wanted me to do.

Regret, guilt and despair are all essential elements of self-sabotage. Negative emotions keep you down in the sewer when you could be using that same energy to climb up into the daylight.

I started going to Our Lady of Victory shortly after I began working at my new job on Wall Street. It is a small, lovely little place that was founded in 1944 by Francis Cardinal Spellman at a time when "victory in the war was in sight but not yet assured."

My mother used to work in the financial district in the 1950s when she was a secretary at the Wall Street Journal. She met my father while on her lunch break one day and, I just recently learned, she used to pray at Our Lady of Victory. So worshipping here is a kind of homecoming for me.

Light It Up

I’ve attended a few services there and gone to confession once, but lately I’ve been going nearly every day to pray, recharge, and light a candle. After last week’s fiasco, I pretty much had to crawl down the block and go through the church doors on my hands and knees. But I made it.

And that’s when I saw the woman in the white veil. She came walking up the aisle and instead of sitting in a pew, she got down on her knees on that hard floor and began to pray.

I’ve seen people do this in the past and my cynical side has done an emotional eye roll while snorting, gosh, somebody is looking for attention.

But not this time. Now, when I was in such a fragile state, I had nothing but admiration for this woman. She wasn’t showing off; she was showing us the way.

I couldn’t see this woman’s face and as she bowed deeply before the altar, and I decided that didn’t want to. I guess in my twisted condition I wanted her to be more of icon than a person; my own version of the Madonna.

I was more interested in her faith than her face.

Even as I stood right next her to light a candle I made sure not to look her in the eye. I could be standing next to her on the subway and never know it.

Okay, I am obviously disappointed with this latest outburst, especially after a recent impressive victory, if I say so myself. But I’m on an emotional journey and, like any other long trip, you’re bound to get lost sometime.

Last week, I went off the road and deep into a hole, but I climbed out, and now I’m back behind the wheel.

Victory is not assured, of course, but it’s definitely back in sight.