Amoebas looking through a microscope

This morning I've found myself thinking about my story. Not in a reflective way where I'm trying to make meaning of it all, but rather in a questioning way where I compare it to the stories of people I know. 

The lives of people around me always seem to be somehow easier or better than my own. The people seem to glide through life without difficulties, hard times, or trials - at least the kind I experience day to day. I tell myself that he or she seems to have it put together or that he or she doesn't seem to struggle with the things I do. I am the "odd man out" who just can't seem to get it right

But all of this is based on my limited awareness of her or his story and my self-absorbed obsession with the things I experience. When my focus is always on my experience of life's events and how they stack up against my expectations or hopes, then my life becomes a continuous litany of comparison and contrast where I am always somehow less equipped or fortunate or blessed than the other person. However, there are big flaws in that view.

My comparisons are limited by what I know of another person's story and by my own myopic obsession with my own. Self-awareness, something I've found to be a key to finding one's place in the world, can be misleading because it's subject to the distortions that come from limited perspective. I can come to know my story intimately, but only from my own limited view of it. There is no assurance that what I perceive is actually the truth, I must have some other's objective perspective in order to gauge the truth-fullness  of my view.

In the same way, my view of someone else's life is very limited. I have no insight into the struggles of his or her heart. I don't hear the deceptive and frightening whispers that they wrestle with in the quiet hours. I don't even know the full breadth of their life's battles - where they've been, where they are right now, what concerns loom on their horizon.

So what do I do with this? I think one simple answer is to turn my eyes off myself and my situation. I  am a mysterious creature who cannot fully comprehend his own story and its meaning. As point of fact, I've recently had moments of self-awareness where I finally came to understand my motivations during events that occurred decades earlier in my life. I realize now, in the my middle years, that I don't even know myself. I guess it's akin to amoebas looking at themselves through a microscope Or even self application of the observer effect (aka, the Hysenberg Uncertainty Principle) - what I see isn't really me because self-examination changes me. 

Nor do I have the ability to fully understand the life of another person, who is similarly unique and full of mystery and cannot be fully known by themselves (or even less, by me) for the very same reasons. No matter how much I try to distill someone down into a simpler, more digestible package, they are far to complex for me to really understand. I dare not be so arrogant as to presume that I can really "know" what it's like to be that other person because my view is so limited and that inevitably shows the expanse of my foolishness.

My head hurts. 

This started with a glimmer of awareness that I have very little awareness at all. I guess it ends with something simplistic; perhaps even too simplistic for some people to accept. 

Humility. Trust. This whole line of thought takes me to those two places. If I am to serve those around me and my perception is so very limited, finite, then I have to trust that there is a larger perceptiveness available to me. Some One that accurately sees the other person and myself, knows us fully and loves us as we are. I also have to believe that I can trust Him to care for me and the ones I love. 

I find no other basis for having some hope, peace, and security in this life except that these things are true. I also see no other reason to hope that I might be of some good in this world except that He chooses to use me to accomplish those things. In and of myself, I am far too limited.

Asking the wrong question

This morning I read a section in a book that made me stop and ponder. Not just think, but really stop and consider the deeper implications of an idea.

Author Robert Benson (not the actor) wrote a book titled "Between the dream and the coming true" that contains a bit of wisdom I've tried, less aptly, to weave into my work with people struggling with job fit. He notes that too often we ask the wrong question in life. Rather than the common "what should I do?", he says we should be asking "what should I be?".

Benson goes on to make the point that what we do should really be a an extension or illustration of who we are. Of course, therein lies the rub. Too many of us still haven't attained a comfortable notion of who we are. We fashion our lives around some image of what we think we "Should" be, rather than a certainty about who we are.

I often tell my younger clients (I'm in my late 40s, so anyone under 35 is "young"), that there's a widespread myth that when we get to a certain age all of the pieces slip into place and we just know what we are to do and be. The majority of my clients are middle aged and older, so based on my experience there's no substance to that myth. Besides, I haven't found it to be true in my own life.

What is true is that some people settle into an unpleasant acceptance of being ill-fit into their life roles. They join the millions Thoreau spoke of as being a state of "quiet desperation". But there is another way.

An "other" focus

I've just come from a networking referral group that I was fortunate to lead. I say fortunate because it gives me an opportunity to teach what I believe is true.

I exist to serve others. It's counter-intuitive, especially in the business world, but it's a principle that makes for great tangible and intangible rewards in life. Doing something for truly benevolent reasons, just to see the other person better off comes back to you in ways most of us can't even imagine.

A great referral group is made of individuals who are deeply invested in seeing their referral partners' businesses flourish. A measure of the group's growth is how actively its members are out working as their partner's marketing department. In those situations members prove their character through their actions and that reinforces the commitment they have for each other.

Some would call this Karma, but I think its just a good rule for living. And it has another unintended benefit - better mental and emotional health. If I'm always focusing on bringing good things to the people around me, then I have less energy and time to focus on my own problems. In short, I'm less neurotic because I don't have the bandwidth to be so self-absorbed.

To find out more about my networking group go to this URL: http://www.referralexchangeorganization.net

The illusion of risk-free living

I've been impressed lately how often we have a goal of living risk free lives. We don't use those exact words, but use terms like "financial security", "high yield", "good prospect", and "passenger protection system". We build wealth, pad retirement funds, get good health insurance, buy "safer" cars, and many other things to help us move through and exit life with as few hiccups and bumps as we can. 

This isn't some kind of rant against the "evils of wealth", I wouldn't mind being in a position where I had the "discretionary income" I've read about. It's just that too often I think we live acutely tuned into the dangers that surround us and try to find ways to shield ourselves from those things that might upset our status quo or worse, leave us damaged or less well off. 

With few exceptions I lived most of my life in a risk-averse posture; making smart decisions, being safe, doing the expected thing. Although I might have sometimes worn the facade of a rebel and risk-taker, these were the things that really marked my life.  No skydiving, running full-out, and taking things to the edge of the envelope - I was stable, predictable, prudent, conservative and very, very vanilla in my convictions. The problem with that kind of living was that it never let me explore what else life might have to offer. 

Today I've found myself musing on Thoreau's reflection that "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation". I find myself very saddened by the number of my friends and acquaintances that have bought into the illusions of this world that avoiding discomfort is the goal. I wonder if avoiding discomfort is actually the greater risk because it places us in a position that prevent attaining the greater gains. Perhaps the thing that feels like a coccoon of security may actually be an air-tight body bag.

Today I'm choosing to live life in pursuit of the greater gain and turn a deaf ear to the siren song of security and the klaxon's of impending doom. Today I'm going to step out on the ragged edge and trust my fate to someone bigger than me.