4.2. The two dynamisms

The energy accepted and progressively freed reinforces the positive pole, object of conscious

willfulness. It is a two-fold movement: from the center to the periphery and from the periphery to the center.  Thanks to this reciprocal dynamism, anchorage to the end and transcendent value frees the subject to accept other dimensions of his being; the vitality that he receives from it becomes means and instrument to live the central passion of his life more intensely.

The result is the profile of a saint, an integrated man, master of his energies because he learned by hard work to keep them somehow reined in; capable of tenderness and profoundly human gestures because he hasn’t become rigid by rationality and control, nor has he been detoured by subtle narcissism and by some pretension of perfectionist sufficiency which deride everything emotional. He is capable of desiring good and letting himself be attracted by it because he has not killed his desires and capacity for good will, maybe even out of fear of being able enough to control his “lower” self; free to give and receive, to love and be loved, to choose and renounce; capable of mysticism and asceticism.

To reach this integration, which is not… given as gift to anyone, nor it is fruit of a simply theoretical synthesis; we need to recognize and experience the angels and the demons who co-exist in our life. Integration is fruit of advances and setbacks, of rising and failing, of renunciation and recuperation, to the point of being crystallized into a strong center that attracts and harmonizes everything. When the saint considers himself a very vile sinner, unworthy of salvation and of God, he tells the truth, because he is speaking of the shadow dimension, of those sinister mazes in which our chained demons reside. In a project of holiness that realistically takes into account a certain anthropological model, in which the human person is neither saint nor sinner (but both), these are chained, but not dead; and it is necessary to integrate them continually, so that their power does not upset the balance of the one in formation, but helps him grow in the direction of the promised land; that is, his own identity, as God wants him. ³