Personal Reflection on "The Seven Storey Mountain" by Thomas Merton
Reflecting on Thomas Merton’s "The Seven Storey Mountain" brings to mind the profound depths of the human journey—a pilgrimage into the heart of longing, struggle, and ultimate surrender. Merton’s life, unfolding in these pages, feels like a mirror to our own search for meaning, belonging, and wholeness. His story is one of continual reaching toward light, even when surrounded by the shadows of doubt, confusion, and inner turmoil.
What struck me most as I read was the sense of deep thirst in Merton’s heart, an ache that we all know too well. It is the thirst for truth, for authenticity, for a life lived in communion with something greater than ourselves. Merton’s quest reveals the layered landscape of the soul—a landscape not easily traversed. There are peaks of joy and valleys of despair, moments of clarity and times of profound silence. Yet, as Merton shows us, it is in the very act of seeking that grace begins to stir.
He reminds us that the spiritual life is not about perfection but about presence, about allowing ourselves to be led, sometimes through the very deserts we wish to avoid. There is a humility in Merton’s journey, an acknowledgment that we cannot arrive at peace or truth by our own efforts alone. We are drawn, carried by a force beyond ourselves, toward a hidden wellspring of love.
What I find most compelling is how Merton’s reflections invite us to embrace our own imperfections, to see our wounds not as barriers but as thresholds to transformation. His words echo the truth that the soul is called to ascend, not through grand gestures or heroic feats, but through the simple, quiet work of surrender—step by step, storey by storey, until we find ourselves resting in the sacred stillness we were made for.
In Merton’s ascent, there is a recognition that the world’s beauty, with all its fleeting promises, can never fully satisfy the deep hunger within us. Yet, in his retreat from the world, he paradoxically finds it anew—transfigured, suffused with grace. His life is a reminder that in seeking the divine, we discover not an escape from the world but a deeper capacity to love it. The mountain he climbs is both inward and outward, a journey that calls us to encounter the sacred in all things, even in our brokenness.
Reading "The Seven Storey Mountain" invites a kind of gentle surrender to the unfolding mystery of our lives, trusting that, like Merton, we are being guided—often through winding and uncharted paths—toward a place of deep peace and belonging.
All my Love and Light,
An
