In The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the people come up with a big question, “What’s the answer to life the universe and everything?”

You may not know the book, but you’ve probably heard the answer:

42

There is a dark irony and utter absurdity in this book. Written in 1979, there was a apocalyptic luxury in the western world. Yes, we had plenty of everything we needed.

Except a sense of safety. Have you heard of nuclear proliferation?

By the 1980’s we had been eating well and accumulating stuff with reliable regularity. And yet we didn’t have a sense of safety.

To dial the lens back for a broader view, prior to the dark nerd humor of the hitchhiker’s guide, history had provided the darkest events ever.

So much  had been learned from the factories and efficiencies of the industrial revolution. Nazis turned these tools for their social engineering plans. This moment brought human slaughter and suffering of nearly unimaginable proportion.

I have recently read Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning. Viktor Frankl is a famous psychologist, and equally famously, a Holocaust survivor.

He describes the experience of living in the camp, and working in horrendous conditions. They were underfed to the point where their bodies began to visibly consume their muscle mass to sustain life. They were sadistically beaten and abused.

All this is ugly, and hard to look at.

When I read Frankl’s book, he brought something new. His fascination with psychology had begun before he entered the camps, and in the camps a wide scope for exploration.

Did he really find the meaning of life in the concentration camps?

He declares: “Life is unconditionally meaningful.”

Take that, Hitchhikers Guide.

We do have meaning, every single one of us. Without having to prove it by anything.

Unconditionally meaningful

It’s not that we have to prove ourselves worthy of the air we breathe. He says that life does not owe us, we owe life. Our best efforts, our best selves.

Do we suffer? Let’s not suffer if we can possibly avoid it, and yet there is a lot of unavoidable suffering in this life.

He ought to know. His experience gives him the right to say this.

So if we are experiencing unavoidable suffering, we can bring our life and ourselves to that suffering ennobles us and we ennoble it.

Damn.

I wasn’t aware that was an option.

There is an enormous truth to the idea that life is unconditionally meaningful. If we know that the meaning is there, no matter what, that changes the search.

If I I know that I will find a thing, I will not give up searching. And like Douglas Adams said I might need to check my assumptions:

“I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you’ve never actually known what the question is.” (28.2-6)

I’ll keep looking. I know I’ll find it.

It’s Olympic season and we’ve been watching world-class athletes. There are more sports than we can remember that are competing in a competition of the world right now.

I don’t know how to do the things these athletes can do. But as I watch and listen to the commentators giving critiques on their performance, I begin to see that the position of the parts of their body seems to affect the outcome.

I might root for them, yelling at the TV “Keep your back straight! Watch the feet! THE FEET!”

As if they have not spent thousands of hours learning how to do the amazing things that brought them to this pinnacle of athleticism.

Who am I to tell them to do better?

Of course I remember when I was younger, or in better shape, and could enjoy the feeling of my body being strong, quick and flexible.

I admire them, and am awed by what they can do. I have a vague idea of how hard they had to work to get there. I know I will never be what these elites have become.

And sometimes I listen to the commentators critiquing and myself judging what they are doing and think, who are we to be so critical?

Have we done the work?

It’s exciting though, to watch. My daughter was bouncing out of her seat as we were eating lunch at a restaurant and the Olympics were playing. Ski jumps.

We were fascinated.

Chris said, “It reminds me of Eddie the Eagle. Do you know who that is?”

He was famous in his time. As a citizen of the U.K. he wanted to be an Olympic athlete, and though he could ski, he didn’t qualify.

One thing the British Isles does not have is tall mountains.

Eddie learned that there was no British ski jumping team for the 1988 Olympics, so he put himself forward as the contestant.

He was not that good, but he showed up. And he got in.

And as I watch these Olympics and feel inspired I can realistically know that sometimes my super power is in showing up.

I can show up and give it a good go.

That’s often what is needed most.

3 Steps to Creating Your Vision

Now here are those questions you’ll need to answer (remember to answer them from the point in the future when your vision has been reached):

What does your organization look like?
How big is your organization?
What is your organization famous for?
How do you measure success? (Be specific)
Why does anyone care about what you do?
What do you refuse to do?
How do people who work here feel about their jobs?
What is your Mission and Movement?
How do you, the founder, feel about the business?
What are the 3 most important things you offer your clients?
What’s your role in the business?
How do you find prospects?
What kind of people will you need to hire? (skills, attitudes)
What are everyday tasks?
What do employees, clients, community, and peers say about your biz?

Set aside 30 minutes when you are most creative, lock the door, avoid all distractions, and put it out there.

I’ve talked before about enjoying fantasy genre fiction. Is there a hero that fights against huge odds to win? I’m in!

Right now I’m reading Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson. In this story, there are spirits, called spren, that that on visible form. One of the things they represent is the emotion of the characters. There are shamespren, gloryspren and honorspren.

What would it be like to have my emotions be so readily apparent to the people around me?

There are as many opinions as they are people, right? But when it comes to emotions, I live with mixed emotions about almost anything. It has to do with the stories we tell ourselves.

Am I happy because I got a raise? Or am I resentful that it is so small and too late?

Valentine’s day is coming. It is well known that many men are trepidatious about what to give their wives or girlfriends on this day, because of how it could be received. Will she be happy, or mad? It’s tricky.

These emotions are tied to the story we tell ourselves about what is happening.

Are those stories true? Do we know what the reasons and motivations for how those around us are interacting with us?

Did that guy ignore me and slight me, or did he just not hear me?

We can’t know. And it is possible the people around me aren’t entirely sure why they behave the way they do either.

I think it would be disastrous to have external manifestations of my emotions. I would not want to have to explain the way I feel at any moment.

Some of my feelings come from how I feel about myself. And a lot of them come from how I think other people feel about me.

Emotions are so complicated. And if I am unable to fully understand my own feelings, how can I assume that I can understand someone else’s’?

So did that guy mean to cut me out, or did he just not hear me?

I am thinking it serves my interests to give everyone all the benefit of the doubt.

If I can’t know, why not choose the happiest interpretation of events?

There are no little spirits to tell me otherwise, so I can choose what serves me.

I started college as soon as I finished high school. I thought I’d have a head start and get done early, right?

It took me a long time to finish. Stuff. Supporting myself, and family stuff.

But I loved school so much. I love college and I wanted to keep going. Years went by when I couldn’t take any classes.

It was a long deferred hope. And it was a cherished cherished cherished goal.

Until one year, circumstances aligned and I could go FULL TIME for a whole semester. Then that glorious moment when I realized if I went ONE MORE full time semester I could actually graduate.

That one year was the only time I had spend a full school year in college. All the night classes finally added up and I could spend a full year.

What a year! Studying and reading and carrying fat books. These teachers shared their knowledge with me, and I looked at the requirements in the handbook. I checked them all off and I GOT MY DEGREE.

The worst part about getting my bachelors’ degree? Being done.

I loved sitting in classes and learning new things!

What was I supposed to do now?

Seriously. I’d had this nurtured hope for so many years. Once I’d accomplished it I didn’t really know what to do.

I felt like I’d been travelling a paved road. It was steep, sure. But I always knew exactly where it was and how to travel it.

Once they handed me my diploma, the road ended.

It was the jungle, baby.

Now if I had somewhere I wanted to go, I had to break out a machete and cut a trail.

That’s a different thing altogether.

It’s very nice to have the trail already laid out. All the milestones and detours specified.

It’s beautiful.
But going on my own? That’s a mess.

I’m not likely to get there directly.

And it’s an unanswered question of where “there” even is.

I’m finding it’s changing a lot.

Lately, I think it’s even more important to pay attention to what I am looking for in this path.

There are still other people in the jungle, and they will come alongside and pull me onto their path.

I can get swept into their orbit, and be influenced by their idea of where we are supposed to go.

Yet, in the end, I am the one who knows where I am aiming for. Other people can’t tell me what I want.

It’s better if I listen to where I want to go. I’m the only one who knows that.

1. This Monday I had to lead a team of installers around s government site. The govt was shut down, remember?So my contact who Was supposed to get us a key and meet us around wasn’t there. We had to figure it out.
   My installers are retired military guys and you’re a lot younger than me. we knew the address but we couldn’t tell where it really was.

   So on the theory that they knew where this might be I let them lead me around. we went hither and Yon not finding what we needed.

   “This feels like being a teenager where I’m following people who think they know where they’re going. “

   “No I really think it’s over here. “

It was my daughter’s birthday this Monday. She turned 9. She is her very own self, with some of her personality taking after me and some after her daddy.

She enjoys watching documentaries, like her daddy.

Not my thing. I like reading books.

And writing them.

This month I was asked to be part of a writer’s facilitation series at my church. There was interest in the topic.

The interested people were some very interesting people who thought they might want to share their stories.

The first in the series was a discussion about memoir writing. I was not the facilitator, but I attended to get the feel of the series.

People wanted to share their stories. These dear people had lived long lives and seen much.

I came away with some things to ponder.

How does a person tell the story of their whole life?

I remember when I was trying to start the story that became The Russian American School of Tomorrow I didn’t know how to scale the mountain.
And I had to tell it.

I settled upon telling the story of two friends. But I couldn’t tell the story of those two without telling about this other person.

And that gave me a place to start.

The other problem was where to stop. That took a lot longer to discover.

I was thinking about the group of participants in the writing series. They had a lot more life under their belts.

So here’s where the concept of documentaries come in.

You can tell a history. But history doesn’t have a point. What’s the point of Egypt?
Just for example.

When I tell a story, it has a point.

Which is why it took me so long to find the end of the story of The Russian American School of Tomorrow.

I had to figure out what was the point of this bit of history.

My husband studied history in college. I studied literature. I was telling him the topic of this Weekly Wonder, and he said:

“They don’t teach storytelling in history classes. The best kind of history is stories.”

I can agree with that. It takes more than a string of facts to arrive at a story.

For me, it took taking one little part, one year.

Making sense of the events of our life is probably the point of going over our histories.

He came by to see me. I don’t see him very often. This time he came by and we had something to eat and something to drink.

We caught up. I don’t see him so often anymore. We caught up on what is happening in each other’s lives.

A little bit.

And there came that point.

We always come to that point.

I was actually trying to avoid it.

But there came that point when I brought up the same thing I bring up every time. For this person, it was to talk about how he could stress less and take care of himself. How he could give himself a break and not give in to everyone else’s expectations.

This time I said “What are you hearing when I tell you this? Because we have the same conversation every time we talk.”

We do. I think maybe he heard me. But I always think that.

Here’s something I’ve learned about giving people advice:

Every time I am telling someone else what they need to do

No matter how much they need to do it

No matter how much they don’t need to do it

I am telling myself what I should do.

That’s a saying, Every time you point your finger at someone, you’ve got three fingers pointing back at yourself.

So.

Right about now,

How would my life be better if I gave myself a break, and didn’t let other people’s expectations crush me?

What if I let there be some room for other people to help me, and let there be room for good things to happen?
What if I made time for the stuff I *like*, not just the stuff I am obligated to do?

Because I have this conversation every time.

I guess I still need to hear it.

Over the New Year’s weekend, I was reading a book The Last Policeman by Ben Winters.

It’s a police detective sci-fi novel. The police detective stuff has been done frequently, and done well. Ben Winters poses the scenario:

What if the police detective were trying to be a detective which a life-ending asteroid hurtling toward earth?

Slowly.

It will take about a year to get there.

So what does everyone do when they know this life (and that would be all human life) ending asteroid is coming?

I’ve heard the maxim, “live every day like it’s your last.”

Well, that’s nonsense. If this were my last day, You cannot reasonably do that. If this were my last day on earth, I certainly wouldn’t mow the lawn.

Or go to work.

But if it were my last year?

That’s a bigger scope. In this novel, anyone with means is considering leaving their jobs and going “bucket list.”

Which is all fine, but then how do basic needs get met?

Cell phone coverage gets a lot spottier when the people maintaining the lines are less motivated. And not even there.

Of course, reading about this story, I think about it. What would it be?

How could I really decide what I would choose to do with a consequenceless year?

What do I really like best?

I did not miss the irony that I was reading this book over the new year. Which is also my birthday.

What is it? What is the thing?

Cell phone coverage gets a lot spottier when the people maintaining the lines are less motivated. And not even there.

Of course, reading about this story, I think about it. What would it be?

How could I really decide what I would choose to do with a consequenceless year?

What do I really like best?

I did not miss the irony that I was reading this book over the new year. Which is also my birthday.

What is it? What is the thing?

One thing I know for sure is it’s not one thing.

It takes a bunch of different things to make a life satisfying and balanced

Like the commercial “Part of this balanced breakfast”

It takes the mind blowing and the mundane to make life work.

And it takes trying and tasting and moving on. Some of the things I loved once are not a good fit anymore.

And some of them I’ll never leave behind.

It’d fun to think about—what would I do if it were really the things I like best?

Happy new year, readers! It’s 2018, how did that happen?

Whaaatttt?!

Time to think about what it is I’m doing with my years, as they stack up.  I did a new years ceremony with some friends, and we all came up with our WORD for the year. how we each want to show up and be in the next year.

It’s funny. At this point, I have crossed off a lot of the definable goals. Graduated from college. Have a husband, daughter and a mortgage, not in that order.

I have published a book. More than one.

I have a career.

So now it’s more about how I want to feel.

Have you seen that video of Jim Carrey talking? He says “I wish everyone could be rich and famous, so they could see that it isn’t the answer to anything.”

Well, damn. So what is?

All those things I felt like I had to have, like i couldn’t be me until i had them–the achievements and statuses–what now?

Me and my friends wanted to think about what we wanted to feel like. How we wanted to experience life.

This is a new idea for me. Is it because I have reached a certain age? Or is the whole zeitgeist coming to realize this?

The phrase is “core desired feelings.”  How does my life make me feel? Is that how I want to feel? If not, can I do something to change it?

Guess what my word is. I choose:

EXPLOSION

Go big or go home! But still, they way I think about it is that explosions have to be very strategic or they are not effective.

I want to explode on my days and in my life with precision, to make an IMPACT.

that requires directing my energy and then

BAM

That’s how I want to live in 2018. That’s how I want to feel.