have them, that they are a manifestation of egoism, or the internal
battle between egoism and love, and then find the way to overcome
them, through analysis and self-aware inner reform.
What do you mean by self-aware inner reform?
It is the reform of the spiritual interior directed by ourselves, knowing
clearly what the objective of this reform is (the advance in love and
the elimination of egoism), what the defects are, how they are
manifested and what the tools to eradicate them are. That in this path
towards improvement we can learn so much from observing both our
virtues and defects, as well as the virtues and defects of others. Find a
moment of tranquillity each day to be by yourself, to meditate on the
defects, on your attitudes of the day and the attitudes of others, to
what extent you have acted through love and to what extent you
have acted through egoism. To what extent others have acted
through love and to what extent through egoism. And then, if you do it
sincerely, it will help you to find the answers that you need to advance
and it will comfort you so that you confront your tests with greater
integrity. If you detect egoistic attitudes in others, understanding them
will allow you to handle them better and not arouse hostile attitudes
towards them. If you detect them in yourself and you notice that you
have allowed yourself to be led by them, it will also be good, because
you will have been conscious of them. Set yourself the firm intention
that the next time you will try to feel and to act with more love and less
egoism. In this way you will advance a little every day. If you are
persevering in your self-aware inner reform, the day will come when
you will look back and you will not recognise yourself as you were,
being conscious then of the enormously positive change that you
have made.
Good, but I was led to believe that one of the norms for being a good
person is not to judge others and now you are telling me that to be
better people we must look at the defects of others, as well as our own.
Is this not a contradiction?
You say this to me because normally when people bring to light the
defects of others they do it to criticise or to make fun. When people
have bad intentions, they are usually quite unfair and transform and
exaggerate the truth, with the aim of knocking down the person who is
the object of ridicule, without having any consideration for him or her.
Of course this attitude is regrettable and Jesus himself condemned this
repeatedly “You see the mote in your neighbour's eye, but not the
beam in your own”. It is for this reason that many good-willed people
think that speaking about defects is something bad.