One can almost always say we are living in challenging times: when are the times not challenging? Yet these last weeks and months with the papers full of government spending (whether you think the money is being spent in the best way or not), the heartbreaking statistics on home foreclosures and unemployment, and the dwindling figures in many folks’ retirement accounts, I think it is clear that this is a challenging time.

I recently came across Robert J. Wicks’s Riding the Dragon: 10 Lessons for Inner Strength in Challenging Times. It’s a small book, about 150 5×7 pages, by a psychologist on the faculty of Loyola-Maryland’s graduate program in pastoral counseling who maintains a practice specializing in helping helpers—therapists, pastors, relief workers, all kinds of people who spend their time reaching out to those in need and sometimes need a wise listening ear themselves.

His opening pages include a quote from David Brazier to the effect that many therapists will oblige people who want help driving our dragons back into their caves, whereas Zen offers dragon-riding lessons, and a line from Shunryu Suzuki saying that one must be the dragon and then will not be afraid of the dragon.

Riding or being the dragon involves entering into one’s own dark places, illuminating them with the light of truth, and facing them honestly. It’s hard work, but work which allows a person to return to the bright gifts of life without being afraid of the unseen or unexamined.

Sometimes people need the help of a therapist or a very wise and trusted friend in order to make the journey to where the dragon hides out, but Wicks offers lessons in riding the various dragons that we stumble over in everyday life.

He urges readers to develop patterns in their lives, patterns of caring and having concern for others without adding their burdens to our own, a genuine compassion which is not spiritually depleting.

Wicks encourages frequent—at least daily—periods of silence during which one can quiet down and “let the dirt of the day settle.” For those without the time or inclination for lengthy meditation, he urges taking ten minutes or even two in the morning or at night to touch base with one’s inner self and put life in perspective.

Difficult situations, he said, shake us out of our ruts and offer the opportunity to see our lives in a new way. If we can accept them (however unwelcome they may seem) and put them to good use rather than just running away from them we will be riding our dragons to new heights.

Riding the Dragon could be useful for anyone interested in spiritual and psychological growth, but like Wicks’s practice it is geared especially toward those who spend time helping others through difficulties.

Riding the Dragon was published in 2003 by Sorin Books, Notre Dame, Indiana; www.sorinbooks.com.