I don’t like to get all religious on this blog, but once again, God led me to a small thing that’s exactly what my soul needs.  Just about a month ago,  I found a wonderful book of devotions in the Laundromat. Those have been so helpful and comforting to me.

Today, I decided to look at the books that were marked-down at the grocery store, in hopes of finding an entertaining novel to read.  Maybe something fun like a “beach” novel, something I could enjoy and then give away when finished.    I usually avoid “Christian” novels because they’re not usually very well written (and are sometimes too obviously religious, which I find offputting).  Be that as it may, almost immediately a book called “Crossroads” by Christian author William Paul Young (author of “The Shack“) caught my eye.  I picked it up and read the blurb on the back, and I scanned a few pages.  Well, well, well.  Crossroads seems to be a book about an egotistical businessman who apparently developed a narcissistic, cold personality as a result of some sort of horrible trauma when he was younger.   He doesn’t believe in God and is cynical, materialistic, and unhappy.   One day he suffers a brain hemorrhage and almost dies.   I won’t spoil anything else (and besides, I haven’t read it yet so I don’t know what happens) but it’s got to involve this protagonist’s spiritual transformation.

Wow.  I write about narcissism; it’s a terrible problem in the world today and lately there’s a big part of me that wants to help not only victims of narcissistic abuse, but the narcissists themselves (in some kind of professional  or spiritual setting and context, of course–I am no contact with all my former narcissists and plan to remain so).

Coincidence?  No, I don’t think it is.  Finding this book (marked down to just $4, which was exactly what I had on me in cash!) couldn’t have been more perfect for someone like me at the particular stage I am at in my healing.   I found it when I was picking up a few food items after mass this morning, during which I had become particularly emotional during the Eucharist and felt filled with the Holy Spirit.

How can I doubt God when things like this keep happening?  I know he’s leading me in a direction unique to me and that everything that happened to me was training for whatever it is he’s leading me to do.  At this point, I trust his judgment much more than mine. When I try to make my own choices without God’s guidance, I usually make terrible ones.