Here I will write concerning living deliberately and carefree. Since this has been a matter of some contention between us I will be as clear and precise as I can. I think that perhaps one of the reasons we have disagreed on this point is our failure to agree on our terms. Therefore, I will give extra attention to the definitions of the words “deliberately” and “carefree.”
When I speak of living deliberately I am speaking of living on purpose, or with purpose, and direction. My experiences with myself and others have lead me to believe that people often lead with their natural appetites and emotions. Sadly, our passions are often selfish. In their most natural state they are only concerned with self gratification and self preservation. My purpose here is not to discredit passion—a life without passion is an empty one—but simply to encourage you to be wary of its direction and end. God gave us our emotions and passions. They are what make life precious and enjoyable, but only when they are directed aright by our intellect. Anything that God has given us, if used improperly, is a cause of sorrow, not joy. Living deliberately then is about directing our passions and emotions “on purpose.” Rather than being a servant to our passions, and allowing them to control us, we must be their master and control them. Even Paul, when speaking of his own passions, said, “I will not be brought under the power of any.”
So, how are you to apply this practically? Whatever things you like, or as we are prone to say, whatever things you “love” should be subject to the question and direction of your intellect in order to live on purpose. If you are simply blown by the winds of your passions then you cannot live a fulfilling deliberate life. You will not arrive at any place “on purpose.” You will only land where the winds of passion take you. If you live in this way it will be as if your life were a paper-airplane. With no pilot and only the wind to give it direction, you never know where it will land or how far the plane will fly. You only begin to live deliberately when you trade in your paper- airplane for a real one and decide to pilot the plane yourself. Now you have control of the plane. You can direct it through the turbulent winds, even use the winds to your benefit, and when the winds alone have taken you as far as they can, you can travel even farther by the motor of intellect. When you have done this you can decide when and where your plane will land. A person who does not live deliberately will direct his passions selfishly at best; at worst he will not direct them at all.
The person who does not direct his passions at all is modeled by many Americans. He is ruled by his passions and not the ruler of them. This person has no idea where he wants to go but isn’t bothered too much by it because he hasn’t given it much thought. He is content to work the same job day to day, not because he really likes it, but because it allows him to pay the cable bill. This person lives to eat, sleep, work, and play (with whatever time he may have after eating, sleeping, and working). This is the person who “vegges” in front of the television every night, and “vegging” is a very accurate description. Living this way is closer to living the life of a vegetable than it is to being human. This person does nothing significant with his life. He has chosen the path of least resistance. This half-life requires hardly any effort at all and leads to a miserable and ultimately unfulfilling existence. This is the paper-airplane life. He was cast to the wind and very shortly thereafter made a nose dive towards the couch in front of the television.
Now, for some the paper-airplane life is just too sloppy. They know that they want more, so they use their passions to get them there. They get out of the house instead of watching television, and they pursue a career instead of a dead-end job. They direct their passions, but only to selfish ends; either to become rich, or simply to please themselves. Again, I am not discouraging the pursuit of passion. I strongly believe that every person should pursue something about which they are very passionate. I just believe that the most fulfilling things, the things that we can pursue with the most passion, are things which extend beyond ourselves and our passions alone very seldom lead us there; they must be poked, prodded, directed, and carried farther by our intellect. Our passions only serve ourselves only. We must make the intellectual decision to direct our passions away from ourselves in order to make them serve something greater. Is it any wonder that Jesus says we must deny ourselves in order to follow Him? If a person only serves himself I am afraid that he will be disappointed. For example, if a man were to become a doctor simply because he loves medicine and it pleases him to practice it, he would find himself dissatisfied with his life in a very short time. Being lead by his passions only, he chose an occupation to serve himself only. One might object and say, “But a doctor does not serve himself, he serves other people.” Ah, but in this case his service to others is only accidental. It was not part of the motivation that drove the man to choose the profession. Think here of Paul’s statement, “Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profiteth me nothing.” Feeding the poor will help others, but without the motivation of love this service is only accidental and it profits nothing. Motivation matters. This doctor’s decision was wholly selfish. He chose it only because he enjoyed it, and that is as far as the winds of passion alone can take him. This life is a step up. We might call this the hang-glider life. This person knows where he wants to go and is able to use the winds of passion to get him there, but he can only go as far as the wind will take him, and it can take him no farther than the Landing Pad of Self. He has no motor to take him any farther than that. Altogether, he is still at the mercy of his passions. This life gets nearer to the destination, but still does not arrive at the goal of living deliberately.
I should think that if a man were to become a doctor with the intention of helping others that not only would he be a better doctor but a much happier man as well. That decision would not only be a passionate one, but a deliberate one also. That would be the airplane life. He uses the wind for his flight but he is not controlled by it. Not only is he able to give his passion direction, but when the wind brings him to the Landing Pad of Self, he has the power to fly onward to the Land of True Fulfillment in the country of Contribution to Others.
Living deliberately is not ignoring passion. Neither is it directing your passions selfishly or allowing them to blow you wherever they want (which usually is not very far). Living deliberately is about recognizing your passions, directing them on purpose, and making the intellectual decision to push them beyond yourself. A selfish “purpose” is hardly a purpose at all because you are the one primarily served by it. What is done for others is not done “on purpose” but only accidentally. Therefore, what good is accomplished by you mostly dies with you, and we are all quickly headed to the grave. William Law wrote, “No one is to live in his employment for such ends as please his own fancy, but is to do all his business in such a manner as to make it a service unto God.” In this we hear echoes of the first Corinthian letter, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” So then, I commend these things to you with a hearty “Amen.”
But what if a man’s motive of passion is hidden from him? What if a man is stirred to pursue music but he is unable to discern whether his intentions are selfish or whether they serve something beyond himself? Should he proceed and pursue his passion anyway? This is a particularly difficult question but one that must be addressed because I have found it to be the rule, not the exception. Sometimes people like a thing because it serves themselves. Other times they like doing things because they contribute to others, but they are unaware that this is part of their satisfaction. Most often people “just like” to do things and cannot give reasons as to why. All that I have learned thus far leads me to say, “Yes, such a person should still pursue his passion.” Though this life later may be discovered to be the life of a hang-glider it is still better than the paper-airplane. At least in this life he may serve others accidentally. The paper-airplane hardly serves anyone, even by accident. So, though I believe that he should still pursue his work, I will offer these three suggestions.
First, he must make sure that he has truly questioned himself. Very often the only reason a man has not discovered his motive is because he has not cared to look for it. Sometimes men will not give this an honest effort because it proves too difficult, but we must remember that the most difficult things are often the things most worth our time.
Second, if after making a valiant effort to discern his motives they are still hidden from him, he should proceed. However, as he goes forward he should not forget about the importance of motive and regularly report for heart check-ups (the spiritual kind). Sometimes a man’s reasons for doing things are not immediately evident, but if he will proceed and continue to question his motives they will reveal themselves.
Third, what if, after pursuing his passion, he discovers it to have been followed for self gratification only? I can see only two options available to the man who would live deliberately, and one of these is to be preferred over the other. Once a man is granted the wisdom and humility to admit that his passion has been self serving he can either abandon this work in order to find another which he can pursue unselfishly, or he can give a new direction to his existing one, and extend it beyond himself. He can return the hang-glider and trade it in for a real airplane, or he can build a motor while he glides. I should think that the latter of these two options is preferable. Abandoning any passion, regardless of how selfish one recognizes it to be, is difficult and not easily accomplished; however, there may be occasions where this is the only option. The goal of living deliberately is to live both a passionate and purposeful life: passionate because you do what you love, and purposeful because you do it for others as well as yourself.
Now, we move onward to living carefree. When I say “carefree” I do not mean a life that is lived without caring for anything. If that were my definition then living deliberately and living carefree would certainly be in opposition to one another because living deliberately involves pursuing those things for which you care most. When I speak of living carefree I mean this in the biblical sense; I mean living without worry. I am sorry to say that this is a very difficult thing to do.
First, in order to live carefree you must live deliberately. It is the fear of the unlived life that causes a person to worry most. They worry that their lives are being wasted, and what’s worse is that many of them are being wasted. Don’t waste yours. Make your life extraordinary.
Second, in order to live carefree you must accept failure. We will only be perfect in the life after this one, but that is God’s business, not our own. In this life you are certain to be imperfect and you must accept that. This does not mean living a mediocre life. That would also contradict the deliberate life. What this does mean is that you no longer worry about being perfect. If you are set on being perfect then you will never be happy or worry free because you will never attain that on which your happiness depends. It is a paradox, but not accepting failure is what makes us feel the most like failures, and accepting failure is what makes us feel the most successful. If you are a perfectionist then all you will ever see are your imperfections. However, if you accept imperfection as a part of the human condition then you are free to recognize the things that you have accomplished. Accepting failure allows one to forget about being “best” and to be satisfied with getting better. We must grow as individuals in order to live happy carefree lives, but it is the journey of growth that we must enjoy, not the unattainable destination of perfection.
Allow me to explain further. If I accept failure as a certainty then its arrival will not shake me. Life will be exactly what I expected it to be, and disappointment only comes from unmet expectations. If I expect to be perfect, then I can expect to be disappointed. However, if I expect to be imperfect then I will not be surprised when I find that I am (nor will I be dissatisfied when I discover that others are imperfect, but that is a discussion for another time). It needs to be said that expecting to be imperfect does not mean expecting to be bad. As I grow as a person, I am better, not worse, though I am still imperfect. I have more successes, but always with some failures. Also, when I speak of expecting failure I do not mean that one expects failure at every attempt, only that given a long enough time line everyone will eventually fail. Some may think that accepting failure is a deterrent to the pursuit of success and greatness, but it is just the opposite. People often do not pursue greatness because they fear failure (the lack of perfection). People who accept imperfection as a reality fear failure much less, or not at all, and thereby free themselves to pursue extraordinary lives. If Thomas Edison had expected to create the light bulb upon his first attempt then he would have been disappointed, and he may have even quit, but because he accepted failure as a part of the process he was not deterred from his success. He saw failure as one step closer to the goal. He is reported as having said something like, “I did not fail a thousand times. I successfully found a thousand ways not to make the light bulb.” Whether or not he actually said that is a matter of some debate, but it still teaches this important truth: failures are not only certain, but necessary, to success. To reject failure is to reject great success. Whenever we view our failures in this light (no pun intended) they become triumphs. Our failures often teach us what not to do. You see then how that the expectation of failure results in more success, not less.
Let us go further. There is a sense in which Edison failed even after creating a working light bulb. If we ask the question, “Did he create a perfect light bulb?” We would have to answer, “No.” His light bulb is still being improved, and perfection by definition cannot be improved. Now, what if he had been satisfied with nothing less than perfection? He would have been a rather miserable man. Not only that, we may not have the light bulb today. If he had been satisfied with nothing short of perfect then he may not have thought his success to be worth sharing. Edison may have said, “I failed. I’ve created a shining pear with a very short life. How useless! This glowing piece of junk is not even worth sharing!” He may have burned his research, returned home, and wallowed in self pity being disappointed, down trodden, depressed, and completely unhappy. Thankfully, that is not the kind of person Edison was. He knew that his bulb was not perfect, but he (and the light bulb for that matter) had grown. He had gone farther than anybody else. Instead of hiding his imperfection, he gave it to the world. The world then took what they also recognized to be imperfect, and made it even better. If I were to tell you a story about a world which thanked, rewarded, and praised failure and imperfection you might call me crazy, but that’s exactly what the world has done with Thomas Edison. In our present world, so concerned with perfection, we have often overlooked the beauty of imperfection. Do not worry about failure. It is going to come. You cannot avoid it. Instead, accept failure as a stepping stone to greater success.
Third, in order to live carefree you must free yourself from worldly attachments. Everything is transient. Let me repeat that. Everything is transient. Everything. This includes your life. It includes my life. And it includes all of our possessions. Whatever you have today you will not have forever, either by life or by death, either by the passage of time or the end of time.
The first and easiest things from which you must rid yourself of attachment are possessions. Things. Stuff. In the past year I have known two people who were brought to sobbing tears because their vehicles were not working properly. Their vehicles were not irreparable; they were both fixed in fact. But while their vehicles remained damaged their lives were miserable. I cannot refrain from quoting Jesus on this point. “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” If your happiness has strings attached to stuff then when those strings are cut, and they will be cut, your happiness will float away. Living carefree is about not worrying and the chorus in this same section of the Bible is “Do not worry!” Listen to Jesus again, “Is not the life more than food, and the body than raiment?” You are not your clothes. You are not your khakis. You are not your shoes. You are not your stuff! That is not your life. Food and clothes are necessary to sustain life, but what life is is so much more! And really, do our things make us happy? We all know deep down that they do not. One of the most cliché proverbs tossed around is “Money can’t buy happiness.” So why do we keep acting like it can? You cannot be attached to things because you will constantly worry about when those things will disappear, and let me assure you, they will disappear.
Finally, you cannot be attached to life; not your life, or the life of others. You may think that I am being cold here but allow me to explain. One who worries about his life or the life of another becomes preoccupied with its end and vain attempts to extend it. In doing so a person loses the capacity to enjoy life. The sooner you accept your mortality the sooner you are free to enjoy the time you have. The one who worries about his death becomes sad when he sees beauty because he does not know how long he will be able to enjoy it. Some men even become angry with God in view of death. However, the man who accepts his mortality sees the same beauty and treasures its view because he knows his time with it is short. He will “suck all the marrow” out of every moment. That same man will turn in praise and blessing to God because he was allowed to enjoy the moment. The one who worries about the death of a loved one becomes preoccupied with the time that he does not have with that person rather than the time that he does have. The one who accepts the temporary nature of life appreciates the smile of their loved one even more. He savors every laugh, takes notice of every tear, and thanks God because he is there, then, at that moment. Live in the moment; do not worry about the future. “Take no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.” All we have is now, and life is never more beautiful or more real than it is right now.
When you free yourself from the attachment to others you should not only accept the reality of losing them to death, you must also accept the reality of losing them to change. Sometimes people move away. Sometimes people drift apart. The people that you have in your life right now may not be there tomorrow, not because they have died, but for some other reason. This often tempts me to hold on tighter in an attempt to keep them from drifting away, but I have found that letting go actually allows me to love them more. True love is love that seeks the best for the other person. When I try to hold on what I am really saying is, “Having me in your life is what is best for you.” But what if it isn’t? What if what is best for them is out there, beyond the horizon, away from myself? Will I hold on anyway? If I do then I am not being loving, I am being selfish. I am keeping them close, not because I love them, but because I love myself, because it makes me happy to have them there. When I accept the possibility of losing people to change, not only does it allow me to love them more fiercely, but it makes me less sad when they leave. I suppose if I were to do it perfectly I would not be sad at all, but as we have already discussed, none of us are perfect. The only way to free yourself from worry is to have nothing to worry about. You do not worry about losing things, because they are not that important anyway, and you do not worry about losing people because that only ruins the time you have with them. Besides, what’s best for them might be over the horizon.
Living deliberately and living carefree are not in opposition to one another, in fact, they are necessary to one another. You cannot live deliberately if you are full of worry because your doubts and fears will stop you from pursuing your passions. You cannot live carefree if you do not pursue your passions because the thing which causes the most worry is the possibility of a wasted life, and rightly so. Don’t waste your life. Appreciate what life is, not what it needs. Live deeply. Love fiercely. That is a life worth living.
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