My reading habits – OK, I tend to read everything that’s put in front of me, from books to the backs of toothpaste tubes – lead me in to all sorts of places. As part of my daily spiritual development I often read essays / blog posts from a number of Christian websites, and today encountered the following phrase:
a diligent person must learn to be neglectful
If you’re interested, the article it came from is here. It’s quite an eye-opener, isn’t it? I have to say that when I read it I did a little re-take and then started thinking.
What does the word diligence mean? It’s probably one of those words which we all have a similar but slightly different meaning for. It’s one of those old words which carries with it a hint of adult responsibility and legalism. We speak of being diligent in our duties and responsibilities; we have phrases like ‘due diligence’ that have special meaning in law and business. But what does the word actually mean?
The best (to me) definition I found was :
constant and earnest effort to accomplish what is undertaken
; persistent exertion of body or mind.
I also learned that diligence is one of the seven heavenly virtues.
I should also point out that in much of what I do I am probably less than diligent. I can be diligent when I want to be or need to be, but let’s say it’s one of those aspects of my character that is still under development and, given that I’m now 55 years old, is likely to continue to be a work in progress.
To some degree I guess that if we do what we plan to do we’re all capable of being diligent. Constant and genuine effort, exerting the body and mind over time and repeatedly. The ‘persistent’ part of that definition is probably where I fall down – I’m usually capable of being diligent for a while but then what I call the ‘Oooh….squirrel’ moment occurs when I get distracted. Within this definition is also the idea of ‘focus’ – keeping at it, not being distracted by those squirrels or your phone or your social media feeds.
And then we have that phrase I found earlier this morning :
a diligent person must learn to be neglectful
How does this all gel together?
I need to be neglectful of my social media when I’m being diligent about doing something else. I need to be neglectful of those distractions. I need to be neglectful of the niggling worries and anxieties that I may have brought to the desk with me when I started to write this piece so that I may be best able to exercise that ‘constant and earnest effort to accomplish what is undertaken’.
I’m currently attempting to be diligent with my writing – I’ve sent a time in my diary for each day at which point I will do 30 minutes of writing. It’s a test of my own self-discipline and a desire to get creating again after some years of neglect. The diligence I’m exhibiting has positive behaviours for me to engage in – a set time, set place, stay there writing until the 30 minutes is up. And it has things to ignore – or neglect – no social media, no faffing about getting tea or going to the loo, ignore the day job, ignore the money worries.
I think that being diligent involves a picking up and a laying down of things. The word diligence has a weight about it – perhaps it’s worth regarding it as a habit that can be practiced for and hopefully attained, at least to start with in small doses around certain aspects of our lives. Being diligent in all we do would be great but I think for me, right now, un-achievable. But if I can exhibit diligence in 30 minutes of writing here at my desk, I can also exhibit diligence in how I answer my emails at work, how I approach my daily errands, how I find new work. As the article I read pointed out, there’s a scriptural take on diligence which I also need to take on board!
Maybe ‘neglectful diligence’ is something we can all practice under a less loaded name. Perhaps it’s the same as ‘focus’.
And on that, I need to diligently save this article and write for another 10 minutes.