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This is one of the big questions occupying much mind space and time in my contemplations. With my father’s passing, a 25 year teaching career, and a new chapter beginning these questions remain active. What I considered a good life 10 or even 20 years ago is different from what I consider a good life today. 

Am I living a flourishing life? How could I develop my life in such a way that will create a more favorable environment for growth? What does it mean to be living a good life? 

There are so many different interpretations describing what a flourishing life is. Across the years of human existence, Jesus, Moses, Allah, Buddha, Dalai Lama, Mohammed have taught about what a life worth living should entail. They all have different interpretations and experiences describing what a life needs to be a good life… a life worth living. 

Every individual has a definition and desires of what a good and flourishing life might look like. Success, career, Money, Materialism, Family, Friends, Love, being of service, and more. Many components to consider when looking at what it means to be happy with the life worth living. 

External Validation

For much of my life I had my eyes on the “prize”. A clear direction of what I wanted to do with my life and the goals I wanted to attain. A treasured quality that my father instilled in me. I didn’t care much about how people thought of me around things I did or wanted to do. At least, so I thought, until recently. 

I have been able to feel the youngster inside of me. This child has been searching for and fighting to get mothers love for most of his life. The validation that would tell him he is a good boy and can do anything he wants to do. It’s a similar, if not the same, external validation the adult me has been looking for. In achievement acknowledgments from my career, colleagues and organizations. I’ve been looking for some kind of external validation that would tell me I have achieved a level of accomplishment and it’s acknowledgement that I have done something in my life. Maybe, if I got that recognition, I’d be able to say the life I am living is worthy of existence. That I am living a good and flourishing life. 

I am ashamed and disappointed. Ashamed I am less than a perfect man that my mother wanted me to be. Disappointed that the government job I’ve been in for a quarter century isn’t giving me the pats on the back and the newspaper write ups on the exquisite job I’ve been doing. After wallowing in my self created misery, I realized I needed to live by my own intrinsic nature. My own personal values and things in life that have been, are, and remain interesting to me. 

It was from that realization where I am able to alter my life. I can focus on finding and cultivating deeper relationships with people. Because I have that deeper connection to myself. Making my life more meaningful. Yet, when I was feeling I wasn’t getting the pat on the back or some sort of external validation that I “deserved”, I got angry.  At all the external forces and myself. I felt like I needed to fight for my right to receive something that wasn’t freely given. The shame and disappointment cycle continued. 

If only…. I could design the world around me. To a particular self serving configuration that I wouldn’t be so at odds with. Because changing ourselves is hard to do. If the world would change to the way I wanted it to be, I could hold the world more accountable than the vision I have for the life I want to pursue. 

But I don’t want to be a rat in a maze I create for myself. I guess I have to deal with the part of me that does not want to have the discipline to make the changes within myself. I don’t want to be the guy who plays the victim and who blames the world for all the problems I’m not willing to look at within myself. 

Overcoming Ignorance

The Dalai Lama talks about Buddhism having many practices of powerful medicines for dealing with the different counterproductive emotions we experience. Underneath these “illnesses”  is a single cause, to overcome the “ignorance of the true nature of things”, such as the Law of Nature. Therefore, “practices that teach us how to overcome that ignorance undercut all afflictive emotions. The antidote to ignorance addresses all troubles. This is the extraordinary gift of insight.”

I’ve been a seeker for most of my life. What are these “truths” or the “true nature of things” the Dalai Lama talks about? I am one rolling wave in the ocean and you are the other. You can look across the vastness of water at my wave and still not see me in the way I see myself to be. But the water we exist in together is all one ocean. 

Consciousness creates the illusion that “I” am this particular self-aware, unique, and different wave and “you” are another one. But all that exists is the same expanse of water. We are just temporary structures riding this particular piece of the whole, subject to one of the many “true nature” laws. This one being pointed out is, “cause and effect”.

All of our self created judgments / perceptions of people and things around us are “dependent arisings”. The belief that everything in existence is because other things are. The idea that everything is interconnected and that everyone affects everyone else. 

All of our thoughts are temporary and of a single process, misconceiving the true nature of ourselves and all things. These self created perceptions are counterproductive thoughts, judgments and emotions based on ignorance of the true nature of things. It becomes a cyclical existence dealing with and dispelling these persistent illusions BEFORE any afflictive and bad behaviors show up. 

The idea of meditation is to develop a disciplined attentiveness to the surrounding world and our own perceptions of it. The Dalai Lama says, “All counterproductive emotions are based on and depend upon ignorance of the true nature of persons and things… If we undermine the ignorance that misconceives the true nature of ourselves, others, and all things, all destructive emotions are undermined.”

The Dalai Lama also says this practice cultivates compassion. As we loosen our attachment to ourselves and to cyclic existence, we increase our compassion for the other consciousnesses riding along this process. We see that they (and we all) are also burdened with the persistent illusion of “I” and “my.” They, too, struggle with afflictive emotions and counterproductive behaviors. When we really, consistently see the illusion for what it is, we’re able to have compassion for all who suffer under its spell: ourselves, those we love, those to whom we are indifferent, and even our enemies.

I’m not sure I have a lifetime left to master this practice. But the Dalai Lama promises… “Be willing to familiarize yourself with this attitude, taking on yourself the burden of protecting all sentient beings from all problems; do it repeatedly and with regular analysis. Your empathy will be so great that it will suffuce your entire being. Without any desire for reward, your aim will be solely the development of others, never disheartened or discouraged in your task.”

I will practice

Interior / Exterior

It’s insane to think that we can (re)create the exterior world to match our internal values. It’s just as insane to think the outside world can dictate and define what it means to be living a flourishing and good life. No amount of outside appreciation, love or affection can tell us we are living the life that we want. Just like there is no amount of money or material things that can tell us we have found success in living the good life. 

I look in the mirror. What is the first impression I see? What is the first impression when I look at others? Take a closer look. Am I drawn to get a closer look or is that first impression telling me I’ve seen enough? Letdown? Good from afar but far from good?

Some people, myself, and parts of my life will never be more attractive than the first time I look at them. It’s in that first time where my hopes are at the highest and fulfillment is at its peak. This wide angle lens may be the only time some people and parts of my own life will look the best. Some relationships will look best in that wide angle, more impressive in the first impression. 

And then some people and parts of our lives look more appealing, more attractive, the more we see them. The closer we look. The deeper we dive. When our hopes are highest and desire for fulfillment is energized. In this way, things will always look better the more clearly we can see them. In close-up. With more definition, frequency and intimacy. 

Looking to overcome my own ignorance of judgmentalism, projection of the past and missing the bigger picture. Developing some discernment of whether what I am seeing is what true nature is all about, or if I am seeing things from the projections through my small self. Practicing seeing through the “I”, the self created perceptions. To see the bigger world around me. Getting out from under my own suffering. 

Cultivating empathy and compassion to hold others in theirs. Without needing to get anything back in return. I will develop the skill naturally by practicing just this. No amount of external validation or materialism will come close to this kind of fulfillment. The good life. Seems easier said than done. 

A good and fulfilling life is in service to others, getting out from under the rock of our own suffering, seeing the empathy and compassion we can have for others and the world around us. 

Living Our Gifts, Our Legacy

I loved the work during the course of my lifetime career in restaurants, hospitality, teaching and culinary arts. I loved creating. I loved the long hours. I loved the pleasure I was providing to others’ taste buds. I loved getting lost in the many cultures and cuisines. I loved teaching students to find their passions. I loved the work, the sweat, the process and all the dirty dishes. I was my own man. Following dreams and desires. 

All the roles I was playing were contributing to the story that was my life. The celebrity chefs I worked for, the restaurants I helped open, the students I was teaching. I was more than just a chef, a cook, a teacher. The many things I was doing in my personal life and professional career created a full life for me. It was wild, edgy, dangerous, consequential, lively. 

I laughed loudly, cried harder, loved bigger, loathed deeply, and felt more in all the areas my life was taking me during the course of my life. I became all of the dimensions of my life. I was more than the man I was seeing in the two dimensional mirror and more of a man who thought he needed external validation. 

I was more alive in all the roles that I played in my career than I was in my life. The way our society and culture defined my profession(s) seemed more vibrant than the actual story I was living in my own life. It’s time to make a change. Time to get rid of these societal filters and make my own life my favorite role to play. It’s time to catch the hero I have been chasing all my life. 

As I approach the next chapter of truths for me to cross, I know for certain that my life will recalibrate again. My close circle of chosen family and friends will continue to be at the core of whatever I choose to do. I will practice in my interior world to get out of my small self so I can see and live into the natural laws and universal truths in life. I will operate from the standpoint where I will choose not to engage in any intellectual discussion or philosophy as to how or how much to love, protect and guide my fellow human travelers in life. 

This… a good and fulfilling life!