A year or two ago, I read a book called, "A Life Worth Living." It's based off a Yale philosophy course with the same name. It's deep, but accessible. Something between a survey of world religions and philosophies and a workshop on how to plan a good life.
It tries to help you answer the question - what is the good life? Or something approximately like that. What makes life good? Or what kind of life should we live? Is the kind of life we should live the same thing as a good life? It's tricky.
I enjoyed it, but found I wanted to talk about it.
My younger brother loves to debate life with me. We agree on most things and almost nothing at the same time. We talk theology and politics, parenting and society. I almost always want to hit him and we keep talking until at least 2am around a bonfire whenever we find ourselves at my parents country home together.
I decided to give him the book for Christmas with a note that whenever he felt up to reading it, I'd read it again with him and we'd talk about it.
He called me up and we are going at whatever place works given lives full of parenting, work and church.
We're on chapter 2.
I decided to bring Eddie in on the discussion and had him listen to the chapter on audiobook while I cleaned my room before bed.
Eddie groaned.
Too much thinking about thinking.
It made me chuckle. I love thinking about thinking.
The chapter was still very much laying groundwork for the rest of the book. The main focus was on self reflection.
It used a metaphor of a deep sea dive to explain levels of self reflection. On the surface is autopilot. The place where we live life and so things without much reflection. We're just doing what we do.
The first layer of reflection is effectiveness. How to do what we do ... well? This is where we develop systems and routines. This is where we decide to practice our learn more. How do I become a good musician or teacher? How do I improve my mile time.
The next layer is self-awareness. This is the level of vision board. Who do I want to be? What do I want to do? What is this year going to be about?
The deepest level is self-transcendence. This is the question - what's worth wanting? What's worth living for or doing for? What's true about life? What is the purpose of life?
Eddie groaned listening to this. For him, it was torture to think so much about thinking. This made me wonder, how much time do people spend in various forms of reflection? How much time should we spend at each of the levels.
The stereotype of the wise ancient is one who mostly stays in autopilot because they have answered the question of life's purpose and they have attuned their life to live out this purpose well, reflexively following a life built well with spiritual practices that have built the muscles of living out a harmonious life.
I spend a lot of time at all the levels. The older I get the more I have questions at each of the layers. But I have found it easier to move between the layers and to understand them as distinctly different questions that work together like gears to help me live well.
I can spend time discerning my next chapter in life, knowing well that this season still has a few years left in it. I can also think about how do I live out this season well or what if this is the last season I'm given and there is no next. How do I live well today and how do I possibly live well tomorrow?
Lent is coming to an end. We are nearing holy week. I think following behind Jesus and watching the journey to the cross raises all the questions. Why suffering and death? Why this path? How is this part of the good life? Couldn't God chose another path for Jesus, for me?
There is mystery here that is deep. Deeper than the dark black night sky.
I don't have words for this mystery. But I follow Jesus. On the donkey. To the table. To the garden. At the trial. On the hill. On the cross. Under the stone. In the garden. Here, I find something powerful. Something that turns my life in a direction. I cannot answer with my mind or with my words. Maybe one day I will... or maybe it will trickle up, through the layers into my reflexive way of living, shaping and forming who I am and how I live without ever being to fully articulate it.
I could hope for that. I do hope for that.
As I come close to the cross again, may I be open and laid bare to receive it and to be shaped from my core all the way up. That I may learn to live the way of the cross.
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