Let me begin by suggesting a book: Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life by William Deresiewics.
The text offers some truly pivotal questions about the value that we have placed on the journey we call a “good education” and problematizes our decision to settle for this status quo. The eloquence of the text, to me, is in the assertion that education – synonymous in every way with life itself ¬– is indisputably defined by how you choose to live… the value of what you do is in the doing.
My life cannot be held apart from the world and time in which it exists- this is a double entendre. On the one hand, the conditions affecting my life are those of an environment of people, the coming-and-going of energies, time, heartwarming, and heartbreaking moments.
I am necessarily an affected body on the condition of existence, thus nothing is meaningless; identity, recognition, and change are the markers of a life of meaning. On the other hand, my life affects the conditions of the same ecosystem of people, of energies, time, heartbreaking and heartwarming moments. I necessarily influence the world around me, thus my participation and engagement are invaluable; service, gratitude, and love are the markers of a meaningful life. The common thread between the two (a life of meaning and a meaningful life) is the reciprocity of inspiration.
I was inspired by RIZZARR’s Ashley Williams piece, There’s Gotta Be More To Life, and by her story in having the vision for this platform, RIZZARR, and devoting herself to its creation into the masterful engine it is today.
The impact of inspiration is in the alleviation of fear. In the awkward nexus between higher education and the life that follows is the uncertainty of where the connection is to happen- where do my passions coalesce into a pathway? How do I find the support I need for what I aspire toward? The truth is that these questions are answered no more in a vacuum than life that is lived in one.
Take Ashley’s example: “It has taken all of me, out of me. But it also has taken out of me the notion of the most important things in the world. The things being love, friendship, joy, and most of all, impact.”
Finding the answer to the questions of ‘Who am I?’ and ‘What it is that I am meant to do?’ is the product of the great undertaking of taking the next step. Reach out and be ignored and rejected, then find another avenue to the goal you have in mind.
It requires an uncommon devotion- uncommon because it is not taught per se, encouraged maybe less so. It is the thrill that makes your heart beat faster and for the thoughts to fire off ecstatically.
Through the journey, we complete the cycle. We make the world better than how we found it. This charge is the evolution of the two sides: a life of meaning is a synthesis of the journey, through joy and pain, and the accomplishment of meeting the mountaintop; and a meaningful life is a life providing foundation for the growth of all people, that those who follow can make that first step because you are there (in deed or thought) to guide them up.
It is amazing to me that one day (soon or distant) that someone may happen upon my thoughts- (should I be blessed to have them) my kid(s), their kids, their extended family….
I remember standing outside of a glass case in the Grammy Museum looking down at the handwritten scribblings on a composition notebook page of Tupac Shakur and I thought to myself, “He couldn’t have known the impact this would have.”
But, of course… I now know, he did.
He opened the pages and committed his love, his hopes, and dreams to the paper. Nothing happens in a vacuum. The value of what you do is in the doing.
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