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satisfIction...

"There is a God&shaped void in the heart of every man which only God can fill"

“There is a God-shaped void in the heart of every man, which only God can fill”
So very often we all try to make ourselves happy.
We fall in love, hoping that we’ll find satisfaction for our longings.
We tread fancy career paths, trying to build a lasting legacy that we can look back upon and feel fulfilled in.
We throw ourselves into friendships, hoping that sooner or later those friendships will bud to yield strong relationships we can bank upon.
We soon discover most of our expectations remain unmet and begin to wonder if we have thrown ourselves under a moving bus…
We can’t understand why we are unsatisfied because we try, we try and we try…yet:
The fringe benefits of our friendships seem utterly delayed and sometimes, even completely lost;
Our career paths get muddled up, or we end up where we desired to but without that exhilarating feeling we so much anticipated;
We get married only to remain empty, or even worse we end up in break-up after break-up;
We come to that point of quiet desperation when we discover that nothing can fill this void…and we know because we’ve tried everything…

Quoting Blaise Pascal: “what else does this craving, and this helplessness proclaim but that there was once in man true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled ONLY with an infinite and immutable object; in other words, by God himself"

And if we choose to keep searching, disagreeing with the conclusion reached by this 17th century mathematician; it is likely that we would discover from our explorations,
That having is less satisfying than wanting…
That there is a transitory illusion we get of being satisfied with our newest conquest howbeit, which only lasts till another want comes along.
We discover that every thing else brings satisfIction.

“You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in you.”  -Augustine

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