Allegiance

"To whom do I belong? To God or to the world?"
Many of my daily preoccupations suggest that I belong more to the world than to God.
A little criticism makes me angry, and a little rejection makes me depressed.
A little praise raises my spirits, and a little success excites me.
It takes very little to raise me up or thrust me down.
Often I am like a small boat on the ocean, completely at the mercy of its waves.
All the time and energy I spend in keeping some kind of balance and preventing myself from being tipped over and drowning shows that my life is mostly a struggle for survival: not a holy struggle, but an anxious struggle resulting from the mistaken idea that it is the world that defines me.

~ Henri Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son