IT’S a practice done usually by IT practitioners. They like to tweak on their gadgets, since many of these items, given the rapidity of the innovations taking place now, plus the delicateness into which many of them get, need to be given little adjustments here and there.

But it’s a practice that should also be done on our most important aspect of life. And that is our spiritual life, our life of relation with God and others, which we should try to fill with love and all the goodness that we can put into it.

We should never consider our spiritual life as too private or too personal as to keep it always away from some public discussion meant for the good of all. There certainly confidential matters involved, but there also are many elements that need public ventilation. And one of them is the art of tweaking.

More than the gadgets, our spiritual life, whose seat is our mind and heart, is subject to constant multiple factors. It was St. Augustine who once said that the thoughts and motions that pass through our mind and heart in an instant can exceed the number of our hair. When I read that line, I immediately agreed.

Not only do we have to contend with our own ideas, intentions and plans that just come and go, we also have to cope with the many challenges, pressures, goals, not to mention, temptations and other crazy things that can come to mind. We cannot help but really take care of our spiritual life if only to keep our sanity.

Our usual problem in this department is that many of us seek comfort and relief through some inadequate if not dangerous means. Some just ignore the conditions of their mind and heart.

Others resort to artificial means — a tonic drink, a massage, psychological conditioning, Still others do worse as they indulge in drugs, sex and other forms of deadly escapism.

Spiritual tweaking can take the form of a daily examination of conscience, done usually just before going to bed. It’s an effort to review how our day went, to see if love or something else was the main motive of our thoughts, words and deeds.

Truth is there will always be some adjustments to be made, usually small but from time to time big. We need to fine tune the purity of our intentions, for example, or we need to polish a particular virtue that did not work quite well that day.

Or we need to be more guarded against certain weaknesses and bad tendencies we have, like rash judgment, gossiping, cheating, sensuality, pride, greed, laziness, etc.

Given our spiritual nature, there is always room for improvement in our virtues and need for struggle, since our heart will always be an arena between the forces of good and evil. This will be our lifelong condition.

But all this tweaking is done in the presence of God, confident of his fatherly care and love for us. And so it is moment that can give us great peace and reassurance. God always forgives and understands. It is his delight to do so. We should strengthen this conviction in ourselves, because this is crucial in our spiritual life.

We should never feel alienated from our father God, no matter how bad or sinful we may be. It would be good to keep in mind the parable of the prodigal son whenever we have problems in this area. Whenever we decide to say sorry, there will be no problem, and besides, we can cause immense joy in heaven if we return to God, as the gospel tells us.

So, this kind of spiritual tweaking is not an exercise in obsession. It is done in the context of love between God and us, between father and child. If done in this way, we will avoid the pitfalls of irritation, nervousness, shame, fear and the like. We will also avoid being too fussy with things and fastidious with people.

On the contrary, we will exude an aura of goodness around. We will manage to maintain confidence and dominion over our faculties and powers. We will have good relations with others, as we would become more simple and humble, more transparent, and therefore, more approachable and friendly.

We have to cultivate this practice of spiritual tweaking, and work to make it a living part of our culture. We can be certain that it will only produce good results in our lives, helping us to be more charitable with each other, and more important, to be truly holy. (Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )