Awakening

Awakening

Life is full of many questions: what am I to do? Who am I to be? And in this modern, complicated world it can be hard to know what the right thing to do is. We are told how to live, what to think, how to act, how to breathe. We are told how we should enjoy our days. But what does it mean to be awake to our lives? To be awake to life means to live life deliberately, for the purpose of pure simple joy, such as, enjoying the beauty in the world and the people around you.

Finding the beauty in this world, for me, it means taking more deep breaths and relaxing in the moments. Enjoying things like the innocent laughter of children instead of wishing for a quiet moment. Taking time away from the internet and the news, worrying about what difference I can make in far-away lands, when I am unable to reach them, for now. But instead, focus on leaving a legacy in the heart of my children for the same passions in life.  It means turning off the computer, and reading a book by the cool of the water on a warm summer day. It means planting flowers; nurturing them and watching them grow, finding the simple joy that lies in the beauty of nature. Emerson wrote in his essay “Nature” that, “There is no object so foul that intense light will not make beautiful. And the stimulus it affords to the sense, and a sort of infinitude which it hath, like space and time, make all matter gay. Even the corpse has its own beauty.” He urges us to go out and see the beauty in everything. To shine a light on the world and see it, actually see it, not just pass it by. Even a corpse is beautiful in its purpose because each death is a personal journey that represents an end, an end to a well lived life or even an end to suffering, and there is always beauty in that.

Thoreau invites us as well, to take a similar journey as he did.  He says, “I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour.” He advises us that it is not too late, because we can make the conscious effort to get to know the world around us. To step away from the daily life of working hard, waking up to the “gossip” (news) as he called it, for once you hear it, do you really need to hear it again?  He suggests living our own lives for our own purpose, in our own will.  Emerson urges us to get to know God as we are to know him, not as we are taught to know him. Why do we have to life our lives and set our goals as a model of those before us when we have the right to explore, discover, and imagine as they did. We should not limit our world to what we already know, there is much more to understand. More inventions and innovations to be found, and if we close out what God and Nature has to say to us by conquering the land instead of just living with it, among the trees and the flowers, and the animals. Then we are to ask ourselves, what am I missing? Just as Thoreau said we have the ability to affect the quality of our daily lives, as long as we contemplate, that is, asking questions. We should not be afraid to ask:  why, or, why not? Why do we have to live as we are told?

I myself have already had this kind of personal revelation, and am glad to have been exposed to these essays, and into the minds of such great writers that can relate so eloquently the fleeting thoughts that run in my mind. I have already had this sense of living in the moment, and enjoying the simplicity in life. I don’t want to make so much money that I have to spend my life working hard at something that is as meaningless as a large sum of money. And sure one could argue that because I am not rich I do not know the freedom of this money. But there are things that speak to me, the day I am driving from a trip to the park to see the baby ducks; I pass by a neighborhood of large cookie cutter houses, with manicured lawns, and no fancy cars. Where are all the fancy cars? They are not in the garages of the houses; no they are parked at the jobs, the high paying, and time-demanding jobs. And I get warmth in my heart knowing that I am taking the time to enjoy the real life, to actually live life, not just go through the motions. I don’t see this as self-sacrifice as others may see it, after all who in the world, according to the world does not want to be rich, and have fancy things? No, this is freedom, so that when I am on my death bed I do not wonder what I missed because I don’t want to miss anything. 

To be awake to the world, nourishing my heart and soul, also means living my life the way that I want to live, loving who I want to love, and not conforming to a life that is dictated to me as acceptable to the society that I live in, If you are a Christian you must marry a Christian. If you want to be successful in life you must go to this college and study subjects that yield the most money. Why should we put such expectation on the human experience" No, I want to love who I want to love, learn about things of this world that may just be for the sake of knowing the world, and humans, and their thoughts and their emotions I want my life to represent a legacy where I have built bridges between another heart and mine, leaving a legacy of cultivating truth and love, beauty, and soul, not money, or treasures, or things that crumble, because my heart is for the good of the people, everywhere in the world.  I want to live life, for living. I want to enjoy what I have now, instead of always feeling like I have to reach for more.  I want to be the kind of person that Emerson describes “And in common life, whosoever has seen a person of powerful character and happy genius, will have remarked how easily he took all things along with him,—the persons, the opinions, and the day, and nature became ancillary to a man.” I want to wear the beauty of the world, the heart of the people that I meet, as a badge of honor. I am not here to conquer, but to be a part of this greatness of life.

“Beauty is the mark of God sets upon virtue. Every natural action is graceful. Every heroic act is also decent, and causes the place and the bystanders to shine.”   - Emerson

 Sara Corso