They claim to be our friends

Offering what we think we need

But they lie – it’s an illusion

It all comes with a price quite steep

“I can give you control,” says Doing

“And I can give you security,” says Having 

“I will give you affection,” says Pleasing

But even when they deliver, it’s not enough

Left instead with stress and exhaustion and doubt …

There is another group of three

Their promises quiet but sure

As I shed these other unholy friends

And learn to sit and be

I find all they promised and more

In the quiet and surrender of union …

… with the Three.

“As long as we continue to live as if we are what we do, what we have, and what other people think about us, we will remain filled with judgments, opinions, evaluations, and condemnations. We will remain addicted to putting people and things in their ‘right place.'” Henri Nouwen

“We mostly spend [life] conjugating three verbs: to Want, to Have, and to Do. Craving, clutching and fussing, on the material, political, social, emotional, intellectual, even on the religious plane, we are kept in perpetual unrest: forgetting that none of these verbs have any ultimate significance, except so far as they are transcended by and included in, the fundamental verb, to Be: and that Being, not wanting, having and doing, is the essence of the spiritual life.” Evelyn Underhill, The Spiritual Life