Wasted Life
A friend wrote of “a terrible, vivid sense of having wasted my life.” The shame she felt about this was intense.
It is an experience many could relate to, no doubt.
It may be a natural development in the process of spiritual awakening to become aware of a perceived "wasted" life. Still, to view this in terms of past actions (taken or missed) leads to useless guilt and shame.
The more important consideration, and the one more difficult to detect is this:
Are we are wasting our lives in this very moment?
In the preoccupation with doings that so characteristic of daily life, detecting whether or not this is true can be difficult.
So here are some suggestions which may be useful:
Are we still repeating the same patterns over and over, the ones that were behind the "wasted life" of the past?
Do our thoughts follow in well-worn grooves of attitude and belief, of conceptual identity?
Do we think the same things over and over, with perhaps only a slight modification in form?
Are our emotions like clockwork, always triggered predictably by a given stimulus?
Do we get upset, indignant, outraged, jealous, angry, fearful, etc. on cue?
If any of these questions are consistently answered yes,
It is just possible we will wake up in the dead of night some years down the road with a terrible, vivid sense
of having wasted our lives.
Those questions or just ask, "How fully, in the moments, did we Love?"
ReplyDeleteI see there is alchemy in simply asking those questions.
ReplyDeleteI guess it would be a wasted oppurrtunity if we never asked
and truly considered the Truth of the answers.
Count be nimble,
ReplyDeleteCount be quick,
Count jump into
the question pit...
Do our thoughts follow in well-worn grooves of attitude and belief, of conceptual identity?
ReplyDeleteThank God true life is a journey without end! And becoming more aware, a process! Every time I am tempted to think of my life being wasted is an opportunity to feel what's under it, that shame is the key that unlocks the bars huh? I know every time I pick that needle up when I hear it start skipping, the silence is eternity. Keep on keepin' on...through and in.
If I focused on my yucky habits and stuff I didn't do, I would be killing myself. So, I forgive me my tresspasses, of stepping out, stay in and feel and my heart grows life right?
And of course jump into the question pit! lol