Monday Mainstay: an Emily Dickinson poem

IF I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin	5
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

                                                  -Emily Dickinson

I've decided that Mondays need a little something to brighten them up. So this Monday, it's Emily Dickinson to the rescue.  I think she's eased the aching in countless lives and cooled countless pains - maybe even stopped hearts from breaking. Her words still resonate with us today.

I must say that one of the reasons this particular poem appeals to me so much is its simplicity. She says everything outright and so clearly and elegantly, too. This poem is so utterly sincere; doesn't it kind of stop you in your tracks?

To not living in vain and to Emily Dickinson.

P.S. Additional Thoughts on Man's Search for Meaning

Oh, and maybe Frankl's main point is this: that man is driven by the search for meaning, for purpose. I find that uplifting.

You know all those conversations about whether humans are innately good or innately bad? I go back and forth. I read about horrible things happening in the world, but then there are also people trying to do good. Dedicating their whole lives to it, in some cases. Right now, I believe that people are born with the potential for good as well as the potential for bad. Their parents, their environments, etc. shape them to a certain extent of course, but then they also choose. They make the decision to do whatever it is.

Since I graduated and started working last year, I've been thinking about meaning a lot more. I agree with Frankl, that humans are driven by the search for meaning and purpose (as well as you know, food and shelter and all that). I'm searching for my meaning, my purpose.

I definitely haven't found it yet. I don't even think I'm close. I think I'm still pretty much at the beginning of it, actually. It doesn't really matter where you are, though. You know that line about how it's not the destination, but the journey? Cliched and corny as it is, it's true. So it doesn't matter how young or old you are, how far you think you may be from where you need to go...just start. Search.

And hey, look out the window once in a while. Enjoy the scenery.

Man's Search for Meaning Review (and of course, a few quotes)

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.
-Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

I read this book a few months ago, mostly during breaks at work. There I was, not exactly thrilled about being at work, and then I would travel back in time (15 minutes at a time) to the 1940's, to Auschwitz. To being a prisoner at Auschwitz.

I was stunned by this book. Frankl managed to make life in a concentration camp meaningful. How many people have so much, and yet live their lives dissatisfied? I told myself that if Frankl could make his concentration camp experiences meaningful, surely I could endure work in higher spirits.

I was struck by that quote, how a person always has the freedom "to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." There is so much we don't know, so much we can't control in life. But we can control our attitude, how we react. It might not sound like very much. But it can be everything.

Frankl made it through the concentration camp partially because he knew he had a book manuscript to finish. He had a higher purpose. He had to make it through the concentration camp so he could fulfill his destiny. And you know what? He did.

"If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death human life cannot be complete."
-Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

I'm an agnostic. I'm not sure exactly what I believe. But I'm inspired by this quote. It's logical, too, isn't it? I don't know what the meaning of suffering is, but to believe that there is a meaning to it can help.


"human life, under any circumstances, never ceases to have a meaning, and that this infinite meaning of life includes suffering and dying, privation and death."
-Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

Even if you don't feel like your life has meaning (I think everyone feels this way at least a few times), it does. I can't explain it to you. Maybe no one can. It's yours to make, yours to discover. It's a great, great privilege (as well as a challenge and a responsibility), don't you think?

To choosing your own attitude, your own way, especially in the times it seems like you can't.

Creativity (on Disney lacking imagination, the paradox of creativity, and art)

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/creative-thinkering/201112/twelve-things-you-were-not-taught-in-school-about-creative-thinking

"Creativity is paradoxical. To create, a person must have knowledge but forget the knowledge, must see unexpected connections in things but not have a mental disorder, must work hard but spend time doing nothing as information incubates, must create many ideas yet most of them are useless, must look at the same thing as everyone else, yet see something different, must desire success but embrace failure, must be persistent but not stubborn, and must listen to experts but know how to disregard them."
-Michael Michalko

I have mixed feelings about that very first sentence in the quote. I love it but it also frustrates me beyond belief...it's like asking someone a question (i.e., What should I do with my life?) and having them give the best and worst, most helpful and most useless answer ever: What do you want/think?

(I have to admit, I myself am guilty of giving that answer!) 

I think it's necessary, though, this paradox. You have to let go of everything you think you know, and then sometimes, some knowledge - maybe something you had within you this whole time, maybe something outside finally makes an impact - enters and you create something new.

"Albert Einstein was expelled from school because his attitude had a negative effect on serious students; he failed his university entrance exam and had to attend a trade school for one year before finally being admitted; and was the only one in his graduating class who did not get a teaching position because no professor would recommend him. One professor said Einstein was "the laziest dog" the university ever had. Beethoven's parents were told he was too stupid to be a music composer. Charles Darwin's colleagues called him a fool and what he was doing "fool's experiments" when he worked on his theory of biological evolution. Walt Disney was fired from his first job on a newspaper because "he lacked imagination." Thomas Edison had only two years of formal schooling, was totally deaf in one ear and was hard of hearing in the other, was fired from his first job as a newsboy and later fired from his job as a telegrapher; and still he became the most famous inventor in the history of the U.S."
- Michael Michalko

Who else finds this paragraph inspiring? Walt Disney lacking imagination? Einstein being expelled? Charles Darwin, the fool? Quick, someone tell me I lack imagination and call me a fool!

"If you want to become an artist and all you did was paint a picture every day, you will become an artist. You may not become another Vincent Van Gogh, but you will become more of an artist than someone who has never tried."
- Michael Michalko

So true, right? So whatever it is that you want to do, do it a little bit every day. You never know what could happen. Not all artists are Van Goghs, not all writers are Shakespeare...so the hell what? They're still artists and writers, aren't they?

You have to be willing to be bad, and actually produce "bad" work, in order to get better. 

To lacking imaginations, being fools, and being "bad."

Having It All vs. Having Enough

Full text of the article: http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/07/what-my-sons-disabilities-taught-me-about-having-it-all/260479/

We are chasing the wrong things, asking ourselves the wrong questions. It is not, "Can we have it all?" -- with "all" being some kind of undefined marker that shall forever be moved upwards out of reach just a little bit with each new blessing. We should ask instead, "Do we have enough?" 
-Marie Myung-Ok Lee

I think that's incredibly wise. The more I think about and read this quote, the more I agree. Why do we keep asking if we can have it all? What is with this obsession with having everything? Why do we want it all?

I like dresses. At last count a few months ago, I had forty-some dresses hanging in my closet. Do I need that many dresses? No. Absolutely not. But I like having them. And I continually find myself drawn to dresses when I go shopping. There's always the thought of another dress. I will never own every single dress. It's ridiculous to think about that...but do I have enough? Yes. Much more than enough. (No, that's probably not going to stop me from buying more dresses, but hopefully thinking of this quote will give me some extra perspective.) And okay, this was probably not the best example, but hey, it applies to my life, certainly.

Think about your life. Think about everything you have. No, you don't have everything. Someone has newer, improved, more expensive...well, just about everything - clothes, technology, a house. But think about everything you do have. Is it enough?

Do I have enough? Resoundingly: yes. And I ask you to take a moment: I suspect you might, too.
-Marie Myung-Ok Lee

To having enough instead of desperately pursuing "having it all" (whatever that means, anyway).

Come alive

“Don't ask what the world needs. Rather ask--what makes you come alive? Then go and do it! Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”
― Howard Thurman

I've always loved this quote. It really struck me the first time I saw it. I had one of those moments where I just sat and re-read it a few times and thought. I mean, how many people do you know who seem alive every single day?

I don't have a five-year plan or know exactly what I want to do with my life, but I know I want to do what makes me come alive. I want to be alive, every single moment, every single day. Even if you can't do what makes you come alive every single moment, do it as much as you can. Come alive. 

Neil Gaiman 2012 Commencement Speech

For full text of Neil Gaiman's speech: http://www.uarts.edu/neil-gaiman-keynote-address.

"And remember that whatever discipline you are in, whether you are a musician or a photographer, a fine artist or a cartoonist, a writer, a dancer, a designer, whatever you do you have one thing that's unique. You have the ability to make art.
And for me, and for so many of the people I have known, that's been a lifesaver. The ultimate lifesaver. It gets you through good times and it gets you through the other ones."
-Neil Gaiman

“In a time of destruction, create something.”
― Maxine Hong Kingston

I think these two quotes go together pretty well. It doesn't matter who you are or what you do for a living, I think creating something - writing or taking pictures or singing or playing an instrument or whatever you do - helps in not-so-great situations. Maybe not right away, but eventually.

And there's kind of a balance to it, too, don't you think? When there is destruction, if you create, at least you have added some little bit of energy, of newness in the world. Even if it's just a silly poem you wrote, nonsensical and laughable...well, you did something, didn't you? You created something. And that's not nothing. Maybe it's not on the same scale as the destruction, whatever it was, and it doesn't even out, but still. It's something. You're adding to art, to creation.