Litany of Humility

From the desire of being esteemed,
Deliver me, Jesus. (repeat after each line)
From the desire of being loved,
From the desire of being extolled,
From the desire of being honored,
From the desire of being praised,
From the desire of being preferred to others,
From the desire of being consulted,
From the desire of being approved,
From the fear of being humiliated,
From the fear of being despised,
From the fear of suffering rebukes,
From the fear of being calumniated,
From the fear of being forgotten,
From the fear of being ridiculed,
From the fear of being wronged,
From the fear of being suspected,
That others may be loved more than I,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it. (repeat after each
line)
That others may be esteemed more than I ,
That, in the opinion of the world,
others may increase and I may decrease,
That others may be chosen and I set aside,
That others may be praised and I unnoticed,
That others may be preferred to me in everything,
That others may become holier than I, provided that I may
become as holy as I should. Amen.

Invisible

My Mom worried about me when I was a little girl, she saw me as a follower and thought I might end up in the wrong crowd. I think she somehow saw that I was invisible to others. I am not the first person people call with news, given "just because" gifts or the one that is praised for things that I do. We are not part of most birthday parties and special occasion gatherings. We have a small group of friends with fairly large families. Adding families is more exponential than just a couple more gift bags. It is easy to exclude us. Social gatherings are mostly centered around food. Our food allergies and vegetarian diet exclude us from just about every party food. Feeding my food allergic children is a constant struggle. My children's feelings are hurt when we gather with our friends and everyone but our family have partied together. My children ask, "Why didn't we go to the party?" The truthful answer is, "We didn't get invited."
My entire life, I have encountered, "I didn't think you liked me," or "You didn't seem interested." So many people have imposed on my parents over the years that I bend over backwards to not impose on others. The honest truth is that I just learned to deal with the disappointment of having only friendly acquaintances and few close friends. I am grateful for my long-time close friends, but Hubby is my very best friend. I have become an increasingly private person. We have had so much suffering and stress in the past few years that I don't want to only talk about negative or bad things but that has been my life for years. I'm in a constant state of stress, it is getting to me and no one seems to notice. I'm feeling invisible.