Weekly Soul: Week 17 - Deeply Hidden Instincts and Values
Today's meditation from Weekly Soul: Fifty-two Meditations on Meaningful, Joyful, and Peaceful Living by Dr. Frederic Craigie.
-17-
I don't want to
get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it.
I want
to have lived the width of it as well.
Diane Ackerman
Psychologists love to talk about depth. Depth
psychology. Deeply-hidden instincts and motivations. Deeply-held values. Fine,
but in a world with three (or more) dimensions, there is also length and width.
Between the two, I find that width is the
far more intriguing. A widely-lived life invites and embraces passion. Enthusiasm.
Sometimes, exuberance. You can be faithful to those deeply-held values, but you
are also entitled to be passionate and to experience the thrill of being alive.
The 2007 film, The Bucket List, popularized the title phrase and made it part of
everyday common language. Lead characters played by Jack Nicholson and Morgan
Freeman, both terminally ill with lung cancer, craft a list of life experiences
that that they want to be sure to have before they die—before they “kick the
bucket.” Some of the items on their list would be difficult for people without
the bottomless financial resources of the Jack Nicholson character: sit on the
Great Pyramids, spend a week at the Louvre, visit the Taj Mahal. Other items in
the Justin Zackham script, though, are more accessible and testify beautifully
to our fundamental shared humanity: witness something truly majestic, help a
complete stranger, laugh until I cry.
Bucket list items draw you away from a
narrow path. They involve new exploration, a broadening—widening—of who you are
and how you find energy, renewal and joy.
Some of these items have always been a
part of you. I knew in college that I wanted to have a life partner and
children to love. Grandchildren, too, although getting to this piece of the
bucket list required the complicity of my children.
Other items on your list emerge; you grow
into them. My family never had pets when I was young, and I never gave much
thought to the idea of sharing one’s home with animals. As an adult, my wife
and her sisters have taught me to love dogs, and now it is hard to imagine a
home without the presence and unconditional love that our furry friends
provide.
Your list, like that of the Jack Nicholson
character, may include big ticket items; visiting Machu Picchu or Easter Island,
cruising the rivers of Europe, or flying in a B-17. For me, a modest-ticket
item that has brought me great joy has been hiking along Hadrian’s Wall
(followed, I might add, by the obligatory pint in the iconic Twice-Brewed Pub).
And your list may… should… include
everyday experiences that have particular resonance for you; getting to know
the three-year old next door, singing in front of other people, or learning
enough Spanish to reach out, haltingly, to Hispanic people in your community
who don’t speak English.
The bucket list, by the way, operates in
forward and reverse. The way we have come to use this phrase, we think of it as
a listing of what we hope to experience in times to come. It can be equally
meaningful, though—and often, affirming—to look at the bucket list items that
have already been a part of your life.
The width of your life. Passion and
exploration. Exuberance and creative intention. Extraordinary and everyday.
Reflection
- How do you think about the
“width” of your life? What do you do that adds color and texture to the
foundation of meaningful, value-based living?
- What excites you? Where have
you found joy? When do you feel the thrill of being alive?
- List a few bucket list items
that you have already experienced. Sit with the recollection of these experiences.
How does it feel to recognize that in the midst of all of the other ups
and downs these things have already been a part of your life?
- What is on your bucket list
going forward? Along with items that would take some planning and
resources, be sure to include items that you could seek out or experience
tomorrow.
Author
Diane
Ackerman (b. 1948)
is a writer, poet, and naturalist. She knows what she’s talking about as she
describes a wide life. Along with a master’s degree in Fine Arts, she received
master’s and doctorate degrees in English Literature, choosing for her
dissertation supervisory committee a scientist (Carl Sagan, no less) together
with a poet and an expert in comparative literature. The world, she felt, could
not be understood from a single disciplinary perspective. She taught English
and writing for a number of years and has contributed essays to The New York
Times, Smithsonian, National Geographic, and the New
Yorker, where she was a staff writer from 1988 to 1994. She has always been
fascinated by the natural world (commenting in a 1999 interview that she lives
with the wide eyes of an 11-year-old) and has traveled the world from the
Amazon rain forest to Antarctica to study monkeys, whales, butterflies, seals,
and seabirds. Ms. Ackerman is the author of over two dozen books of nonfiction
and poetry, most famously in the public eye, her 2007 novel, The Zookeepers’ Wife. She has received
numerous awards, including being selected as a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in
2012 for One Hundred Names for Love. She
has also had a pilot’s license for many years, with one of her books being a
memoir of her experience of flight. I suspect the one thing she does not do is
sleep. The quotation, by the way, comes from Linda Breen Pierce’s book, Simplicity Lessons (Gallagher, 2003).
Book Description:
Keywords:
meditation; reflection; inspiration; miracles; aliveness; purpose; laughter; joy; presence; mindfulness; activism; acceptance; gratitude; forgiveness; creativity; civility; hope; affirmation; wholeness; well-being; mental health; personal growth; transformation; inner peace; personal reflection; joy; joyful living; inspirational quotes; inspirational commentary
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