Stop "Working on Yourself"! w/ Fr. Boniface Hicks
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- Опубліковано 16 лис 2023
- 📺 Full Episode: • Father Boniface Gives ...
Matt reads an extended passage from "The Context of Holiness" to encourage people experiencing discouragement. This triggers a discussion on the importance of communion and community in healing and holiness.
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WHAT!!! I just listened to 3 minutes of this. WHAT?? I can stop working on myself after 52 years of debilitating anguish, scruples, self hatred. WHAT? I can just ask the grace of God to resist temptations as they come? Really? These are the BEST words I've eve heard! I JUST ordered both books. Thank you, Matt. Thank you Father.
God bless you on your journey, Ellen. God is good.
Right? I needed this too! First video i saw on the feed first thing in the morning.
I feel the EXACT same way!!! I pray every day for healing, for change to be better and on and on…I’m never better! But now for the first time I “see”…praise to You, Lord Jesus Christ ♥️🙏
What's that saying? "If it sounds too good to be true..."
This is basically the “12 step program”for addiction. Which makes sense because the program has a Christian background.
The little flower said that she would spend her time in heaven doing good on earth, and here she is now in our midst.
What makes St. Therese such a great saint is her great trust in Jesus that He will forgive her and be with her in Heaven. Trust is both stillness and action. The line from her autobiography that sticks with me the most is when she said even if she were the worst sinner in the world she would not hesitate to throw herself into the arms of her savior and trust in His infinite mercy.
As a single Catholic constantly asking myself why I’m not married yet, the answer always seems to be that I need to “work on myself” so I can become worthy enough to be loved by a woman. I wonder how I can apply the wisdom of this video in my situation. I’m not necessarily talking about sin but social awareness. I guess I just have to remember that even if I never end up getting married, God still loves me where I’m at.
you gain social awareness by being more social. YA groups, hobby groups, cold approaching, etc. heck, even hanging out with family more. hearing anecdotes about how to handle situations is helpful (youtube, from friends, etc) but its not the best way. i suggest starting with people that are easy to read haha
dont let the "im not worthy" mindset get in your way. no one is deserving of romance. and everyone is a prize in an of themselves. don't let that get in your way when a million other things already are.
and yeah the operative response to "how do i get better at dating" is indeed "work on yourself." its lame, its a cliche, and there's better advice. i doubt many people have something serious they need to actually work on or else they can't maintain a relationship. finally, i just think a lot of people are just bad at giving advice. doubt yourself less and others more lad. best
God loves everyone, including you. Don’t be so hard on yourself, it’s perfectly ok to be single, and onls God knows if you will get married and when, just have faith.
Yes. I can relate to this to, as a 20-year-old woman. God loves us where we are at!!! ✝🥰
@@serga7486😮😊😊😅😢3
So I spent my 20's wondering when I was going to find the perfect guy and get married, and it took til I was 29, after praying a novena to St. Joseph to send me a Godly spouse. My husband had also said a St. Joseph novena for the exact same thing, without either of us knowing each other. We are now happily married for a decade with 5 amazing kids. My brother got married to a woman who is totally perfect for him (he's sciencey, maybe like you, from your username, and it took a while to find someone who was single and intellectually compatible) when they were both 40. My mom has a friend who prayed for a good husband, and finally, in her late 30's, met a wonderful doctor who had been praying for the same thing and they had 3 lovely girls. Point being, that it is so so so much better to wait for God's timing, because if marriage is your vocation, He is probably either preparing you for your wife, or preparing her, or both. Being single is a great opportunity to get involved, especially with volunteering with your parish or for a nonprofit, which is also a great way to meet a good-hearted woman. You don't have to teach Sunday school: many parishes or Newman Centers need help with their websites or online outreach, or landscaping, or organizing their food bank. Pro-life nonprofits always need volunteers, even to just stuff envelopes. And there is always bucket-list stuff that's easier to do before you get married and have kids, like hike the Camino de Santiago or go on pilgrimage to Rome, also a great way to meet someone. 'Experience Mission' has young adult mission trips to 3rd world countries. Matt met his wife through FOCUS youth missions. I'll say a prayer for you!
"My weakness is always a near occasion of communion." Beautiful. Thank you Fr. Boniface!
God really listens. Today i've been very depressed. I've been dealing with so much self-hatred lately. the thing i hate most is myself. I have this mindset of trying to FIX everything. I'm broken i need fixing. But God answered my prayers and i watched this video. Thank you
That saddens me to read. I struggle with this intermittently and I heard once that the devil wants to rip us apart and if he can get us to do it to ourselves he rejoices at the victory. This has helped me knowing so that whenever I catch myself mentally beating myself up- I stop and say not today Satan! I am a child of God and yes I am deficient and that is why I have a Savior and he calls me his beloved. I pray this can bless you as knowing it has blessed me
Love yourself like your neighbor. If you hate yourself there's no way in the world you can respect other people. Try to process and work through one thing at a time that bothers you the most about yourself. Of course pray and put it in God's hands but work on yourself. Do not stop.
Having a full on breakdown in the gym. “Please don’t hide from me.” The most beautiful words you could say to another being. Thank you. Thank you.
Whenever God meets you, He does not pick a time or place, so I feel you. I also have moments of breaking down at public places hehe
I wish more people could experience how holy the Monks of St Vincent Archabbey are. If any of you have the opportunity, please visit for a retreat, or a meeting of the Oblates, or even to simply visit the the cemetery and pray for the Monks who have passed.
As a neurotic “self-improver” this is gold! Thank you! 🙏🏻🕊️❤️
This is awesome. I work with people that always make jokes that I am religious. I am going to resist the temptation of saying nothing and welcome them back to Church.
God bless you for being religious!
I so needed this right now. Over a year out since I started my journey of recovery after the trauma of abuse and rape, I have gone through so much and had so many lows, and I keep thinking to myself “when I’m better I’ll be able to…” but I’m so many amazing ways in better than I have ever been, I’m doing so well praise be to God, and I don’t want to keep putting my life on hold until I’m perfect
Praying for you❤
❤️❤️❤️
you can live and work on yourself at the same time, you should alway continue to learn and grow anyways, when you stop, you are dead.
I think sometimes we get so involved in bettering ourselves spiritually or growing holier-- however you want to express it--that we actually lose sight of why we are doing this in the first place, to become closer to Jesus, to God. I suspect this is often when we can burn out and want to give up. I think the message here is that God still loves us wherever we are at on our spiritual path and doesn't want our struggles, however well intentioned, to actually become an obstacle to letting Him draw us closer. Also, let's not forget the role pride can play in this. In humility do we draw near to Christ, allowing His healing and grace to transform us .
Well said!! Completely agree ❤
“He makes himself weak by giving us freedom”. 😮😮
This is an amazing clip !
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted
Just figured out that my problems are not the circumstances but my self hatred because I can't get everything right and be a perfect mother and wife as everyone else seems to be. Thank you so much for this video.
Unbelievable how God giving answers all the time, if we are just willing to listen ❤
Imma need some time to meditate on this but I've been struggling with self-hatred and self-destructing thoughts for as long as I can remember and dealt in the self-help stuff that NEVER satisfied me. Read all the books yet nothing works. I'd be paying that one day I'll be free of this temptation to sin. "Working on yourself and be an insidious mask of self-hate for it makes you feel that something wrong with you until you are healed" nuff said.
This is one of those videos that I'm going to chew on and watch multiple times. I'm in a place in life where this has been weighing me down, and you have both encouraged me to reevaluate many current things. Thank you for the work you all continue to do.
Context of holiness
Thanks, Matt and Fr. Boniface, for the great discussion and the quotes from The Context of Holiness! The life of St. Thérèse demonstrates that healing and holiness aren't about becoming someone with more self-sufficiency to overcome temptation but becoming *little* ... someone who knows his or her littleness and brokenness, denies that voice to be self-reliant, and relies entirely on God and the transformative grace that comes from doing His will in the midst of our brokenness. Our wounds, like Jesus's on the Cross, are the contexts of our own transformations that will bring God glory! God bless!
This is especially true for single Catholics that want marriage and to be parents. Women especially.... Always work on yourself, but what happens when you do and you still can't get a date? Crushing....
WOW!! One of the most powerful clips I have ever watched on UA-cam! How freeing and enlightening and brilliant, all at the same time! Thank you thank you for sharing this, it is a monumental UA-cam moment!! ❤
I have worked on healing from trauma, it was a necessary thing for me to do, God led me through it... And I'm so thankful! But ultimately it led me back to the imperfect person I have always been and have always loved. It's a very profound thing to realize you can be loved for who you are. A devotional I've been doing for years says, God calls us more for our weaknesses than our strengths, He can use us in our weaknesses, we don't think we have it all figured out in that area and we are so much easier to mold at that point. How many did He call throughout the Bible that would have not been anyone's first choice. And still God told Paul that His grace is sufficient... I think we should always work on healing, but ask God to lead us at the same time.
Perfection is not attainable and its ok. It does not negate your hard work and effort, the goal should not be perfection, it should simply be becoming "better" more whole, and as good as you can be.
Amazing! I prayed to God to please please help me because I was so disgusted with myself that I could not ‘conquer’ a fear I had even though I know God protects me always. I suffer from scruples and believe me - suffer is the correct description of this condition. And then I saw this video. Thank you for helping me to understand that this is part of the human condition and to be patient with myself handing it to God. And thank you God for putting this video right in my line of vision tonight. Just what I needed - thank you!
Saint Teresa also suffered from scruplucy
Scruples is the worst... oh my gosh...
Reminds me of something I read somewhere that negative self talk is the enemy of self discipline and productivity. How many times I said to myself, "Stop being lazy! Ugh why am I struggling so much with this? Why can't I just do it? I'm so pathetic." It just caused me to become more frozen (for lack of a better word) and not be able to move and do what needed to be done.
The most refreshing thing I've listened to in a long time. This is the EXACT reason I left the self help / personal development world and returned to the Catholic Church after 30 years wandering in the desert. Thanks Matt (from a fellow Aussie)
What an absolutely beautiful soul this Fr. Boniface Hicks is! To think what God must be like is way beyond our understanding! We can't even begin to grasp what a fountain of love He truly is!
Helps me realize that as confession hrlps me become more aware of what triggers me to negative reactions to others (anger, resentment, annoyance, outrage at their treatment of me), I find myself less turbulent interiorly but this conversation is helping me realize that every time someone disrespects me or tries to manipulate me I am being given an opportunity to not sin as a response.
Reminds me of the movie Dodgeball when Kate says to Peter; “I’m curious, is it strictly apathy, or do you really not have a goal in life?” And Peter says; “I found that if you have a goal… that you might not reach it, but if you don’t have one… then you are never disappointed; and I gotta tell ya, it feels phenomenal.” 😂
Any time someone brings up that movie, all I think about is Rip Torn throwing wrenches at them.
Oh my gosh! I’ve been isolating for most of this year trying to “work on myself” and getting to frustrated and depressed. No wonder! This makes so much sense. Thank you for this conversation. 🕊️🙏🏼❤️
Same 🥲
Part of me is like, "I'll lose all this weight and become hot and come back to this young adult group and show those men who didn't like me what they missed out on." ....bruh...
That was absolutely beautiful!!!! Fr. Hicks went off into an explanation which made me say "What?" That was too in depth for me to understand, but when he explained it, I made it to the end with tears of understanding! God bless Fr. Boniface Hicks forever!
The topic was so necessary to talk about - especially the relation between weakness and strenght! And not hiding! Thank you
Greetings from Poland
Thank you so much for this, Matt! St. Theresa is truly a saint for modern times! God bless you! ❤
You have most likely changed many good people's perception of their sins by your wisdom in the podcast. Amazing mate. God bless. Maybe I will stop beating myself up for minor things aswell. Cheers bro. N pints 🙏
I get what you’re saying and it does give hope, but I really do hope I get deliverance from my addictive tendencies. Yes, there is something beautiful about continually going to God for mercy and to rely on Him, but I do think he wants true freedom for me.
I agree to a point. I think there are some things we CAN work on and others that cannot be changed. We should know how to distinguish which is which.
I agree!
I’m constantly plagued from feeling not good enough, this helps a lot. Thank you.
You guys are amazing! Thank you so much for that perspective in that conversation. I have shared this video, and I am going to rewatch it over and over again, because we are all broken and I am very broken but I know I am also loved deeply by our Lord and Savior.
I've been "working on myself" since 2019. And what that means to me, a single person, is that I take passive habits of relating to others or patterns and make an intentional decision to change what is "unhealthy". But as soon as I come into contact with others (like this past week), I find that the wounds of my past are still there. I realize that I can't heal myself and no human can help me, either. It would take a miracle from God deciding to heal these wounds. I can't help but think that God allowed these wounds to exist in me since the beginning. And that, in a mysterious way, these wounds in my spirit and heart reflect the wounds of Christ, like a spiritual stigmata. I will stop asking for "healing", if that's not what God wants, and instead ask them to be redeemed. I unite these wounds with Christ on the cross to be redeemed for the salvation of myself and the whole world. I hold the crucifix in my hand and tell Jesus my problems... And somehow, though the pain doesn't go away, God is there with me in the pain and suffering. AMDG
I relate to your experience
I too can relate to this.
I just got back from a retreat wherein I was learning a lot of this. It is a painful but very worthwhile process.
All the Saints teach this in one way or another… surrender and pray , hope, don’t worry. It’s more about loving God and letting that love sanctify you. He perfects not us. We just need to be open to letting God work in us. At least that’s my take. Very nice read… keep giving us nuggets of spiritual wisdom. Very encouraging.
Beautifully insightful, elegant, graceful, fun, entertaining and true video for my Saturday morning recovery after a very tough week - thank you brothers in Christ 😉🕊️🙌💯
Coming to terms with the fact that you cannot always change yourself is still working on yourself.
Lovely insights and much real, tangible wisdom.
Thank you for this video. I teared up and this moved my heart. Our Father loves us so much 🥹
One of the most enlightening videos I've ever heard on UA-cam! One of the best ever! Thank you so much 🥺
I’m literally crying over here. I love all of this. So sorry I didn’t get that last bit of advice when my kids were little. That’s a beautiful thing - jubilee day 💕
Now this is the type of conversation that makes it worthy to be part of the Church. Thank you so much. It is priceless ❤
Beautiful memories came to me about my early years at Penn State when seeing Fr. Boniface, May God bless him.
Ooh I totally wanted to save this part of the video thanks Thursday!
Beautiful! I needed that explained to me and this was the simple explanation I needed. Thank you
Love this so much and agree so much with what you both shared. Thank you for this! ❤🔥
So wonderful to hear all this
Powerful! Thank you for this!
Thank you, this is such a relief
Beautiful, simply beautiful what father Boniface is saying. Sweet and true. God you are beautiful ❤
Wow.. this is so beautiful 💗
I needed to hear all of this. Thank you!
Wow, I loved this video. Thanks so much Matt.
Beautiful discussion. Thank you 😊
Looking forward meeting you in australia!! So excited
I love the parental advice at the end. Thank you for that gem.
This is such a good video. Thanks Matt and Fr. Boniface.
I so love this
Great stuff thank you
Focus on creating and habituating the new, not destroying or conquering the old. Giddy up fellow Cath's.
Really beautiful. Thanks. I am trying to live with my flaws. While I want them to lessen. This really helped me. Of course I have problems. Really bad ones.
I don’t want to hide , from whence cometh help.
This was very intuitive
Yes AND no.
Yes you must love yourself and accept your strengths and weaknesses and forgive yourself. However NO you should not stop working on yourself.
Manage your emotions learn self-control and watch your thoughts. So I don't agree with you.
Also everyone should take responsibility for their current state of mind by taking steps TO WORK ON YOURSELF.❤
P.S. such a great gift to your kids. "Jubilee day!" You're a fantastic parent.
I'm tired of working on myself for men that will never seem to like me no matter what I do. It's time to forget them and just work on myself gently and slowly for God. Because I'm tired of trying to please people who keep telling me I'm not 'good enough' because I'm not a perfect looking trad model at age 20. I'm sick of it.
So beautiful.
Amazing.
“Miracles of healing”
“My weakness is a near occasion of communion” WOAH! Inverse of a near occasion of sin yet derived from similar places sometimes.
Jubilee day sounds great 👍 i pray that you can get that aspect of it for u *everyday* because the big things don't work on any schedule... 😅 💙❣️
Great clip!
I love that the first question in the Bible is "ayeka" - God's seeking of Adam in the garden with "Where are you?"
I so wish we could drain of the self-improvement goo that still infects our spiritual and moral-growth discourse.
Also, referring to the "utlitarian" analogy, I appreciate how one dude I read pointed out that "meeting our (psychological) needs" is not so much about satiation as it is about "encounter" - "meeting" them in this way.
When Jesus said, "I will not leave you orphaned," he gave us the very promise that makes it safe to "be with" our orphaned-ness....
Beautiful
There’s a huge difference between trying to “fix” yourself and “working on yourself”. Think the title is misleading and leading to confusion rather than clarity.
what are the differences?
I agree. We should work on ourselves all the time. What can't happen is where we get to a point where we have solved all our weaknesses and no longer need God. The clickbait headline does the video a disservice.
I recently fired my nurse practitioner, acting psychiatrist, because he micromanaged and fault found me, while ignoring all my progress.
He than tried to report me to ACS as a suicide risk.
I think he was from Ghana
It was unreal
this clip is so true, good and beautiful
O JESUS THANK YOU FOR YOUR UNFAILING LOVE WITHOUT YOU I AM NOTHING I'D BE DEAD LORD THANK YOU JESUS FOR LOVING ME AMEN!!!!!!!🙏🏽🤲🏽❤️☝🏽✝️🙌🏽
Thanks Matt for the Jubile Day idea, it’s so great! I hope I won’t forget, cuz our first and only son for now is only 3months old 😅! AMDG 🙏🏻
Credit where credit is due. Matt learned it from Scott Hahn, and they discussed it again recently. I saw that interview just a few days ago.
Whoa. Gold.
1:37-1:47 but as a young man, I need to work on myself to become the man I want to be. I’m currently not where I need to be at in order to be a good husband to my, hopefully someday, future wife.
This attitude of “You’re fine just the way you are” may work with women but, not for most men.
Yep, and in addition to that, many saints have struggled their entire lives to better themselves, to grow in virtue, fight their weaknesses and vise's, etc. So this conversation makes no sense.
I don’t think he’s saying not to change your behavior. It’s more about the desire to change your impulses and desires. As you work on improving yourself, you may hope that one day you’ll finally be rid of laziness or anger, but that’s unlikely. Instead, by grace, you’ll learn to accept those parts of your character and not act on them. When anger arises, you turn to God, rather than trying to beat it back on your own. When laziness delays you, you call on God for strength, rather than feeling like a failure for not having the fortitude all on your own.
Fear is not something to be free of, but rather do not let it stop you, that is the definition of Bravery. Have faith in the Lord, He has faith in you.
So true.
Matt in the drivers seat with this one, Fr Hicks just along for the ride. Will Matt be a saint one day? oh yeah.
Its a life long journey. Never stop striving to become a Saint.
Progress to perfetion ends on your deathbed.
Yes yes yes!!!!! 👏
God didn't create me to be strong because that would cause me to rely on my own strength. Rather He created me beautifully with weaknesses so that I could lean on Him and His grace.
Wow I need confession every other day!
Working on youself is a circular deception because you are the self your attempting to work on. We need an outside agent that knows our situation who has the power to act outside of the contraints of time. If I talk about myself as a separate entity then I become a victim of this separation which leads to an adversarial internal relationship.
And here I thought I was the only one that hated myself for been such a sinner.
Amazing video! Lots of food for thought and I love St. Therese! Just to clarify for the chat: sins are deliberate choices and character faults aren’t sins; when the talk about accepting one’s faults and imperfections, it’s probably the latter category. And no, we can’t always obliterate our faults, much as we’d like. How humbling! We can (and should) always choose not to commit a sin and try to avoid occasions of sin.
I can't ignore the syncronicity of seeing this video today
Although there is justice in community, it seems to me unjust and imprudent to unload one’s brokenness on someone else or enter a situation where wounds could be opened.
Further, it seems nihilistic to just rest in our vices of fear etc.. Our soul must be perfected to enter heaven. While selfish ambition is a sin, this self-satisfaction seems protestant (sola fidet). Any thoughts?
Give Dr. Scott Hahn credit for the jubilee day. He explained how he did that as a father when you interviewed him and used that term.
This just confuses me more than helps. Dont work on youself? But we need to work on fighting sin, which means working on ourselves to grow in holiness, which means working on growing in virtue, which requires us to work in ourselves. This all sounds like just something to make us feel better about our weakness without actually being practical...
I guess one thing doesn't exclude another. I can work on myself knowing at the same time I'll never be a perfect version of myself. Second thing is why I want to work on myself, is it trully for God? If so, I should be in prayer as often as possible so that his love enables me, and it's through his grace that I'm being gradually healed.
We can sometimes work on ourselves to feel better about ourselves (or even feel better than others like deep inside) and that's when this self- progress can even be dangerous and can keep us away from God. At least that's how I understand it 🙂
This might be incorrect so correct me if I'm wrong but, I think what they are trying to get at is detachment from the goal of of progress. There is this idea that we can "work on ourselves" , aka we can somehow fix our selves and not be broken. They are saying that this is the work on God and that we should be ok with the fact that we are broken and submit to God's timeline for healing us. At the same time we must cultivate ourselves to receive the grace God gives us so that we may grow in the areas that He wills while accepting that God may not will us to grow in the ways that we desire. So, there are two sense of "working on ourselves" that they are talking about one of which doesn't tie itself to the outcome and thus allows us to both accept where we are and to keep moving when we don't see the progress we want the other one, which they recommend we stop, ties itself to progress and thus can lead to self hatred when expected progress is not seen.
I took it to mean that we hope that God will take away the impulse within us to sin; instead we should accept that the impulse is part of who we are, and pray for the grace to resist it, or when necessary, to repent afterwards. Accept that sinful impulses are part of being a fallen human, and by grace we resist them, rather than make them go away.
I think it’s meant as an antidote to scrupulosity, as well as a reminder of humility, that we cannot achieve holiness on our own.
I believe they are saying to not beat yourself up over your faults and be happy about the good parts about you. You will always have faults and mess up so treat it as a learning experience that brings you closer to God.
Be ye therefore Perfect as your Father in Heaven is Perfect. Forgive yourself but keeping working on yourself. At the end is Great Peace. 😊❤
This was very beautiful to hear, but once I heard that his name is Fr Mark Folley, all I could think of was a motivational speaker living in a van down by the river lol
Matt Foley - Go For it!
Dang. This wins the internet today. 🥹👏👏
Spoken as a good company man.
the last 4 minutes .... .... Also I think people don't understand that in the repetative struggle and pain in falling short, the exercise of perseverence (amongst other virtues) is a swift and hard crushing blow to the head to the darkness and a boon to the triumph of Our Lady's Immaculate Heart' ...