My Deliberate Life


Thoreau spoke of living a deliberate life. Aristotle said that most men lives lives of ships in the sea without rudders. Plato said the unreflected life is not worth living. Pascal believed most men busied themselves with distractions in order not to face the major questions of life. What about you? To what degree are living a deliberate life? To what degree are you guiding your own ship?

You could ask me if I think that I am living an examined life and I could give you a detailed life story in which I explain many instances where I made a mistake and took a step back to examine the situation and learn from that mistake, but I do not think that I could say that I am truly living a deliberate and examined life. For me, there are always times when I, like Icarus, get caught up in the moment. I do things because of my wounded intellect that I would not normally do. The correct thing to do would be to examine every situation and dicypher what it is that I did well and what I did wrong, but I cannot honestly say that I always do that. Sometimes I believe that it is simply easier to ignore or block out events in my life that do not reflect well upon my character.

I face questions of morality and I find that I do not always follow through with the right answer. The least I can do is to step back for at least a moment and take a look at what just happened. Whether I did something immoral by myself or with others it deosn't matter, as long as I can take the time to recognize that it is wrong, why it is wrong, and that I need to strive to avoid making poor judgment calls in the future, I am doing all that I can. It is often more difficult to do the right thing if it is in opposition to what the group asks or even in some cases demands of you. It is up to me to distinguish whether it is more important for me to maintain my integrity or to be accepted by the crowd.

Not only is it important for me to do what is right but it is equally important for me to realize the truth about my reality. This brings into question the clause "Ignorance is bliss." Like Pascal says, do we busy ourselves with things just so we don't have to face the truth. Does one feel better or is one happier being blissfully unaware? I think the answer is two-fold. Firstly, one does feel happy being unaware because he or she doesnt have to face things that are often painful, such as problems in a relationship. However, if one does not become aware of a specific situation that may be painful, then he or she can never grow from that situation. He or she can never expand his or her world view. If a wife was being unfaithful to her husband, the husband would be content for at least a little while with not knowing about it. But, even if he never finds out about it, the relationship will ultimately suffer. The tension would build and build until there is no more room for lies and deception. The relationship would crumble to the ground, and chances are that it would be more painful to find out later and to have to suffer through the tainted relationship along the way than to know about the infidelity closer to its begining. Therefore, I believe that ignorance is not even close to bliss, but rather a furthering of lies that culminates into an even greater pain.

Am I living a deliberate life?
I hope that I can live as deliberate life as is possible. But the simple truth is that oftentimes I don't. Oftentimes my ship is rudderless and I am simply carried away with the current until I can get a hold of the situation.



OPEN YOUR EYES!
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