MY GREATEST FEAR
Thursday Jan. 24, 2019
Worth and value of life matters. I think everyone agrees.
From my viewpoint, most people aren’t happy with their worth (enough never seems to be enough), they question their value/purpose and need a compass to get themselves off the mat and standing up.
Yes, it’s you and me. Not billionaires, slumdogs or lost cultures inhabiting upper reaches of some Amazonian tributary – we are all in this together, we are all getting it wrong and most of us won’t recognize anything close to satisfaction before our permits run out.
Yes, we get a license or permit for nearly everything. Passport or fishing license, health card or driving license and vehicle registration – we are awash is expiry dates and requirements to fill, file, report, renew or pay for some piece or paper and its corresponding computer file somewhere to prove we paid, verified or unexpired – we have what we should have and have it when we should have. Failing which, our library card expires and we cannot check out any more books. Down the road, when the population of earth becomes unsustainable, who gets to stay? Will it be ‘youngest and most fit’, will it be those who are deemed to contribute more/better than others or will it be those who filed their documents and/or paid their fee on time?
At any age, when we feel great (healthy, strong, ebullient) we expect life to flourish in accordance with our ego and dreams.
But when we feel ill or down or pushed aside, the flourish of life loses its luster to thoughts of inadequacy, failings and missed opportunities.
The reality for most of us – as it is for me – is largely unanswerable questions of why we are here, where our ‘here’ really ought to be and whether we will live long enough to achieve that which we want to achieve, whether we’ll die trying or whether we’ll die tomorrow. My greatest fear, is not that I’ll die tomorrow or that I’ll not get-done everything I want to do; rather, it is that one day down this path I’m on I’ll realize quite profoundly that I ought to have been on some other path and I’ll have not enough time or resources to switch paths in time …
