I have been thinking a lot lately of what is a life.  Starting with the obvious things like “why are we here?” and “is there a meaning?” and have discovered something interesting…. The more you ponder the question, think about people you know, people you have lost, people you lost touch with, the more a pattern starts to reveal itself, at least in my feelings…

If an alien ship landed on our planet and tried to decipher the meaning of life by observing the behavior of Americans, they might think that we are really about working and spending.  We miss birthdays, holidays, big milestones and (perhaps most importantly) the little milestones in life that happen every day in order to ensure our place in the pecking order, our job security and our economic standing.  We then spend beyond our means to fill the hole that has developed in our life from a lack of connectedness to others, or the feelings that our importance or meaning in life is based on the things we own or the status they convey to us….

I have started to see my own life not only in the context of me, but where I fit in the the line of those who came before me and those who will come after me.  Do I enrich the world o do I take from it?  Do I help to build, or do I work against things?  Or do i just sit on the sidelines hoping nobody will notice?  Since we are not given the insight of knowing what happens after we leave this life, I have found that a sense of purpose is the strongest anchor one can have.  A sense of purpose is not your job by the way.  It may be, but in most cases I believe it is not.  It is what givs you meaning and it may be more than one thing.

I have been working on finding purpose and aligning myself to that for several years.  It has been hard to break up the old patterns and comforts but I am now starting to make some progress.  More on this tomorrow.