January 1, 2024

After surviving for 80 years with most of my faculties intact, perhaps I have earned the privilege of offering a few words of wisdom to those passing through this thing called life. Although it has sometimes been called a “vale of tears,” and it can certainly be that, it can also be a marvelous adventure and a wondrous mystery — filled with joy, beauty, and love.

Of course, there are many problems in our world, and we must try to deal with them as best we can. But every age has had its dire predictions and warnings of doom, yet we humans have always muddled through, and sometimes thrived.

The current estimate is that our universe has been around for about 14 billion years, and the human species has been on Earth for over 2 million of them. Further, the brain size of average human beings 300,000 years ago was about the same as ours, and people living 100,000 years ago probably had the same capacity to learn and develop as do we.

During that long expanse of time, before you and I were born, there were great disasters and incredible achievements in the human community, and it is likely this will be the case into the foreseeable future. One estimate is that this Earth will be around for another 5 or 6 billion years. So, although we often take our own individual lives to be the center of everything, a lot went on before our brief sojourns here, and a lot is likely to happen after our current lives end, both good and bad.

In this broad framework, there is only one pressing question we each face right now:

How will I live for the rest of my life? Continue reading “80 Years of Lessons” →

November 20, 2023

As I finish 80 years of life — a life filled with exciting adventures and unexpected experiences — gratitude and wonder are at the top of the list of feelings. How did I receive the privilege of this life; how did it happen that I awakened one day into the gift of awareness, of having a conscious experience of living this particular life.

What a blessing it now seems, to have found myself on a planet with so many pleasures and delights, and with the gifts of seeing, hearing, and all the other senses available to experience it. As Thomas Traherne put it in his poem “Salutation”:

How could I expect smiles or tears,
Or lips or hands or eyes?

With Traherne, before they were just there, I too:

Did little think such joys as ear or tongue
To celebrate or see:
Such sounds to hear, such hands to feel, such feet.

Yet he concludes:

The earth, the light, the day, the skies,
The sun and stars are mine — if these I prize.

I too was given this Earth, and the ability to experience it personally, and even the capacities to learn, remember, and reflect. From those gifts, I have been able to put together my own life story, and even (I hope) gain a certain measure of wisdom. Continue reading “Reflections on Turning 80” →

September 24, 2023

The fourth Essay in the Two Worldviews series tackles the questions of why bad things happen, and if the world can really be a good place when there are so many problems.

Does the world seem like a good place to you?

In the United States especially, but other countries as well, polls show that the prevailing attitude about the nature of the world has fallen dramatically in the last few decades. This has led to a sharp rise in loneliness, alienation, drug use, and suicide — even among young people. Albert Einstein defined, in his view, the most important question facing humanity: “Is the universe a friendly place?” And Einstein concluded that he believed that it is, a similar conclusion to that of Martin Luther King, Jr. when he said, “The arc of the moral universe is long,” but it bends toward what is right and good.

Why Do Bad Things Happen?

Skeptico: If the world is a good place, why do bad things happen so often?

Wisdom Seeker: Because most of the time you identify “good” with what you want, with what suits you and your friends. But the world is not set up to fulfill your immediate desires; it is not organized to give you what your ego wants. Thus, before you can really know whether the world is a good place, whether it is friendly to us, you must understand what “good” actually is. Continue reading “If the World Doesn’t Seem Good” →

August 24, 2023

The third Essay in the Two Worldviews series considers the evidence for the worldview of the wisdom traditions.

Either you believe that the wisdom traditions are grounded in a Source to which we can all turn to establish justice, truth, fairness, and other principles we share concerning how we will interact with each other, or you believe that everything came about through random interactions of material things. The latter perspective is the worldview of Materialism, which denies the existence of any underlying values or meanings.

If you choose the latter, then each individual is finally alone, as the existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre maintained. You might join a group for protection, to fight for group power, or for social interaction, but each person in the group will ultimately be in it for themselves. There will be no shared recognition of justice or truth or the common good. Rather, each person will see the group as a place to get what they personally want, will use it to serve their self-interest.

Skeptico: Why does that happen?

Wisdom Seeker: Those who do not believe we are connected with each other in some fundamental way, or who do not accept that there are values that exist beyond the individual, will see no reason to refrain from continually trying to get what they want for themselves, however they can. For those who choose to live within this framework, the final resolution of the endless conflicts it brings can only be through power, so each person will attempt to secure and hold as much power for themselves as possible. Continue reading “Is This a Moral World?” →

July 12, 2023

This is the second Essay in the series entitled Two Worldviews. It focuses on how I made my choice between the two worldviews, and some of the experiences that have confirmed that choice for me over and over.

Skeptico: As I understand what you are saying, the wisdom traditions of the world share the view that values and meanings have a reality grounded in a dimension beyond the individual, that these exist independent of any one person’s wish or whim.

How this came to be is not agreed upon, but the conviction that there is an underlying Source for values and meanings is universal to all. Further, all agree that each of us has the capacity to harmonize our lives with this Unseen Order. Last, each tradition has its own name for this Source, this deep Order, but I like how Plato described it as the Good, the True, and the Beautiful.

Continue reading “How I Chose My World” →

Essay 1

The World In Which You Will Live

June 15, 2023

He who is not contented with what he has would not be contented with what he would like to have.
– Socrates

Greed is good! Greed is right! Greed works! Greed will save the U.S.A.!
– Gordon Gekko in the movie “Wall Street”

A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver or gold.
– Proverbs 22:1

The one who dies with the most toys wins.
– Bumper sticker

Embrace simplicity. Reduce selfishness. Have few desires.
– Tao Te Ching

The state of nature is a state of war of all against all.
– Thomas Hobbes

The world of the future will be different for each of the 8 billion people who live on this planet today. Each of us will experience, to a significant degree, the world we create: Our personal reality will be based on the beliefs we hold and the way we understand and interpret past, present, and future. And the choices we make in response to those things. Continue reading “Two Worldviews” →

April 9, 2023

We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.
– Winston Churchill

To share often and much … to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?
– Martin Luther King, Jr.

I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.
– Albert Schweitzer

In nothing do men more nearly approach the Gods than by doing good to their fellow man.
– Cicero

The perfume of sandalwood,
The scent of rosemary and jasmine,
Travel only so far in the wind.
But the fragrance of goodness travels with us through all the worlds.
Like garlands woven from flowers,
Fashion your life as a garland of beautiful deeds.
– The Buddha

Reasons To Be of Service

There are many ways to find pleasure and satisfaction, but most are fleeting, often dissolving like a mist before the moment is fully past. On the other end of the spectrum, there are only a handful of ways that people have found lasting fulfillment or a sustained sense of meaning. Among those few, service is the path more have taken than any other. Perhaps this is because we sense that we are inextricably connected to others, to nature, and to everything at a fundamental level.
Continue reading “The Call to Service” →

March 28, 2023

Continuing with the theme of the last Essay, “The Web of Life,” all the wisdom traditions throughout history have been based on the recognition of an underlying unity, a connectedness in the universe.

The revolutionary ideas of Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Bacon, Kepler, Newton, and others in the 16^th and 17^th centuries ushered in a new era of thought, and the scientific revolution took off on a rapid and dramatic ascent. Importantly, though, all these key figures who set this ascent in motion continued to believe there was an overall unity in the universe and that a Divine Order provided the basis for that unity. Even the least religious figure among them, Francis Bacon, had this to say:

“A little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to religion. For while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them, confederate and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity.”

Among the leading lights of this revolution, some were quite religious, including the most celebrated of all, Isaac Newton. Nor did their scientific ideas interfere with the belief in an orderly, unified universe. In fact, the idea that there was an order and connectedness underpinned all that they did — their shared mission was to understand it.

Continue reading “The Connectedness of All Things” →

February 25, 2023

Are we humans somehow connected to others in a deep way, or is life an individual journey, perhaps even a fight for survival?

Looking back over my life, most significant memories involve other people: romantic relationships, intense conversations, experiencing other cultures, doing something for another person, working with a team or tight-knit group, being recognized by others for an accomplishment, winning a competition planned by some organization, reading a book and feeling a connection with the author, and writing with an awareness of readers who might find something I say worthwhile.

These are the positive memories. But there are many on the other side of the ledger; negative memories of being criticized by a friend or rejected by someone with whom I was infatuated, being embarrassed when my mistakes or errors were discovered by others, feeling disappointed by the actions of friends or family, hearing negative gossip about myself among other people, and when others pointed out the failure of projects I had undertaken.

In addition to memories, most of my longings and fears have been tied to other people: the desire for acknowledgement and to be recognized; the search for emotional closeness and connection; sexual longings; worldly ambitions; wishing to be of service; hoping to make the world a better place. All these involve other people.

Surveying the vast range of feelings and emotions I have experienced — love, success, victory, anger, compassion, envy, fear, shame, guilt, and so many others — all are a part of the web of connections woven into the fabric of my life.
Continue reading “The Web of Life” →

February 4, 2023

I have heard the word joy used in numerous ways, and it always has a strong allure. But it also brings a nagging ache, for what I think of as true joy seems so rare. What does the word joy convey that seems so alluring, yet is so elusive as we go about our daily lives?

Is joy the feeling that comes when something good happens — winning a competition or gaining a prize? The reward of pleasant experiences or satisfying sensations?

These do not capture the experience of true joy for me. It is deeper, richer, touching a different level of my being.
Continue reading “Is Joy Possible?” →