Launch continuous improvement plan for the spiritual life of the soul

Does your business have a continuous improvement plan? A commitment to continuous improvement is often the mark of a successful enterprise. Inculcating a persistent drive to be better requires the resolute resolve to set new goals and achieve them with regularity. Several notable business leaders have offered strategies for improving the likelihood of generating tangible results.
 
One, popularized by Intel’s former chief Andrew Grove, is OKR, or Objectives and Key Results. In brief, OKR consists of identifying a clearly defined goal along with three to five intermediate key results that track the progress of achievement.
 
For OKR to be successful, the key results and initiatives undertaken to pursue them must be specific, concrete, and measurable. Assessments must generate clear outcomes and determinations. 
Did sales increase 10 percent on a quarter-to-quarter basis or not? Did overhead decline relative to production? Has the product penetrated a new market this year? The proper measurement of the results will vary, but only through some form of evaluation can improvement be tracked and verified.
 
At first blush, OKR would appear to have little to offer to the life of the soul. Any adaptation of a quantitative exercise to the realm of prayer and friendship with God would seem like a fool’s errand. After all, holiness is not something that lends itself to easy measurement. Is saying four Our Fathers always more efficacious than three? Which is better, more time spent in meditation or in spiritual reading? How would one compare the holiness of St. Thérèse of Lisieux with that of St. Thomas Aquinas?

Nonetheless, several saints from different eras have adopted practices that share the specificity and practical goal-orientation of OKR. Saint Anthony of the Desert is said to have encouraged the maintenance of a list of faults upon which one could meditate for the sake of improvement. At the start of each day, St. Bernadette and a companion identified works they would both accomplish and avoid. The two would consult their lists in the evening, and if they failed in one or more respect, they would perform some sort of penance to exercise their souls and condition themselves for better results. For each, the recording of shortcomings facilitated the identification of habitual mistakes and provided an impetus for improvement.
 
In his book The Ways of Mental Prayer, the Cistercian monk Vitalis Lehodey urges his readers to focus on eliminating just one or two faults that are most significant or regular in occurrence. After making progress in one area, the individual moves to the next.
 
Something like a plan of continuous improvement can be operationalized within the spiritual life. Lent is a time for making improvements. Whatever our Lenten practices may be, they should contribute to our spiritual growth.

Consider which of your faults is most responsible for your failing to mirror the example of Christ in your own life. Identify the elimination of that fault as a key result. Create initiatives that would allow you to grow beyond its limitations. Keep track of how often you engage in the act each day. Meditate on what is leading to each failure and consider the preventative initiatives you might take.
 
Like St. Bernadette and her companion, develop some sort of spiritual exercise designed to improve future results. Track your improvement over time. While it might be impossible to measure your holiness, you will at least have some sense as to whether you are growing more or less imperfect in some respect.

The language of successful management can be adapted to the pursuit of something more meaningful than business improvement. Following the example of the saints and with the help of God’s grace, a results-oriented prayer life makes the highest objective come into closer view.