• Meaning What

    • August 3, 2010 10:11 am

    Dearest Readers,

    When I landed home over the weekend after two months away I found a big pile of The New Yorker magazine waiting for me. My father gave me a subscription a couple of Christmases ago and after my initial anxiety over the frequency of their arrival (“How am I ever going to read them all?”) I soon became hooked.

    In the May 31st issue there is an article on the great writer Somerset Maugham who is most well-known for his novels Of Human Bondage and The Razor’s Edge, neither of which I have read. I recall reading one of his short stories in university but I don’t remember its title. His name, however, has stayed with me.

    The writer of the NY article writes that the protagonist in Of Human Bondage discovers “that life has no meaning other than what one makes of it.” I found this very interesting. It’s kind of like the old riddle “when a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?”

    If we were not here to experience Life, would It have any meaning? Without us, without the human experience, is there any meaning to anything at all?

    In my own search for meaning I’ve often thought that we exist in order for Existence to know Itself. Hmmm, I might be getting a little too deep for a Tuesday morning. Let’s go back to the quote.

    “Life has no meaning other that what one makes of it.”

    If I believe Life is meaningless, it will be. I’ve tried the Way of No Meaning. It doesn’t feel very good. Conversely, if I believe Life has meaning then I will come to experience Its Meaning in All Manner of Things. This, too, I have tried. It not only works, it makes Life worth living.

    It’s a rather simple formula, isn’t it? Much more suited to a Tuesday morn.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.” ~ Julian of Norwich


    The Richness of Being

    • May 8, 2010 10:44 am

    Dearest Readers,

    How exquisite and recondite is Life that we can be weeping in grief one moment and laughing our guts out the next?

    As most of you know I have been blogging of late about the death of my friend Leanne Coppen. Before she died, when her friends and family were still convinced that she was going to beat the cancer, I sent an email to one of Leanne’s friends who had taken on the responsibility of gathering items for a silent auction to raise money for Leanne’s experimental treatment in Detroit.

    The gift I had to offer was an hour of Inspiring Coaching. The woman who was looking after the auction emailed me back and said, “Great!” A few days after Leanne died I emailed this woman to check in, acknowledging the sadness of it all as well as the connections, such as ours, Leanne had managed to unwittingly create.

    This lovely woman then scanned and emailed me a copy of the program from Leanne’s funeral as well as the text from Leanne’s father’s eulogy. As I read through his words yesterday I wept with profound sorrow.

    Then I wiped my tears, finished the task at hand and made lunch. Reading through The New Yorker as I ate I came across a cartoon called “F.A.Q.s about the Hadron Collider.”

    Now the only reason I know what the Hadron Collider is is because I read an article about it in The New Yorker months ago. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is something out of a Hollywood movie. It was developed, essentially, with the purpose of understanding the nature of the Big Bang, and in some way, will attempt to mimic the Big Bang itself, if they can ever get it to work. The LHC, its construction, its function and its operation, are astonishing things to wrap one’s brain around.

    So there I am, fresh from a deep cry over the death of my friend, reading this comic by Roz Chast, cracking up laughing.

    The cartoon depicts a brochure with a crowd of booby-looking people gathered together to ask questions about the LHC.

    “What would happen if I went inside it?” asks a Gomer Pyle-ish boy.

    Answer: Just. Don’t.

    “How many miles of pipes and whatnot are in it?” asks a Dame Edna-ish lady.

    Answer: A bajillion.

    “How much did it cost?” she continues.

    Answer: Forty squillion.

    And the best one of all: “If I concentrate ultra-hard, will I ever be able to understand it?”

    Answer: No.

    I’m telling you, I was laughing out loud, all alone, in my apartment, trying not to choke on my food.

    It occurred to me that I had just been balling and that is when I marveled at the mysteries of Being and since Leanne was a comic genius I knew she’d approve. After all, her departing words for all of her loved ones and faithful followers was, “I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes.”

    Inspiring Message of the Day: There is so much possibility in every moment. Grief is necessary. Laughter is vital. We are alive.