Tag: Improvement

A Better Place

Posted on by jabittan

One of the last chapters in Ryan Holiday’s book, The Obstacle is the Way, is titled, “Something Bigger Than Yourself” and Holiday starts the chapter with a quote from Leroy Percy, “A man’s job is to make the world a better place to live in, so far as he is able—always remembering the results will be infinitesimal—and to attend to his own soul.” Holiday continues by sharing  the story of an American prisoner of war who brought unity to a POW camp and continued to serve for the men under his rank in the camp who were all enduring incredible torture and suffering.  By focusing on others, and not himself, the prisoner of war in Holiday’s story was able to better the lives of all, and to make survival an option for everyone during the most challenging point in their lives. 

The story from Holiday and the quote from Percy work together to show that we can find incredible meaning and joy in our lives when we begin to shift our focus away from ourselves and back toward others. There is no perfect balance of how much one should do for themselves and how much one should do for others, but focusing solely on yourself and seeking to only improve your life or the world for your purpose will leave you in an empty existence. Your home may be full of things, but your connections with the world around you will always be lacking.

I don’t approach the idea in a spiritual sense, but our time on earth is so short that there is always something bigger than ourselves that we can strive for. Our own happiness is meaningless in the sea of suffering and challenge around us, but we have the ability to begin to change the tides of struggle that wash against not only us, but of many of those that we encounter.

When we begin to live life thinking of what we can do to make the world a better place for those around us, we can find purpose and meaning anywhere that we are. We can recognize that the timeline of the earth and human civilization will outlast us, meaning that there will be something greater than us that goes beyond our lifetime. Anything positive that we can do now, will have a lasting impact on those around us and will hopefully outlive us. We do not have to worry about how large our good actions are, we only need to worry that we complete those actions. The small scale of positive actions should not dismay us, for we would never get started if we thought that our positivity must change everything in the world.

Look Within

Posted on by jabittan
Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations is a collection of thoughts that the emperor wrote to himself about life and how we should think about all that happens. The philosophy to which Aurelius subscribed and laid out in his book is known as stoicism and it centers around becoming more present in our daily lives and becoming more aware of how we are living and thinking.  Throughout his book Aurelius constantly focuses on the benefits and importance of self-awareness, and what we gain when we develop a meaningful practice of self-reflection.  To that point he wrote, “Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up, if thou wilt dig.”
His short quote reveal three key parts of Aurelius’ thoughts about the world. He is constantly optimistic about our place in the world and where we are heading in the future, he believes that we are all more inclined to be good people, and he believes that a greater ability to recognize our emotions and thoughts will help us become more complete and comfortable in the lives that we live.
What made Aurelius optimistic about the world was his ability to detach meaning from the events which happened to him and around him. On his journey inward he recognized that he had the power to interpret any situation in the way which would suit him the best. He could see The things which happened around him as good or bad, but until he attached a meaning and decided whether something was overall positive or negative, the thing itself was neutral. Living in this state of neutrality allowed him to find a space where he decided how he would respond to things, and where his own opinion was more powerful than the actions of others or the events around him. This gave him more control over his life and world, and it allowed him to approach  the world in a more optimistic manner.
Looking inward Aurelius recognized that all of his actions were based on rational thoughts within his mind. He extended this thought to other people and managed to see people as rational beings. This sounds like an obvious observation, but I believe it is a thought that has been lost by many people in the world today.  We often look at other people in society, especially those we do not know or those who we see making what we consider to be mistakes, and think of them as idiots or morons.  When we approach others in this way we reduce their humanity and cease to see them as rational beings. Aurelius sought to understand people in a greater perspective, and he believed that everyone was taking actions that seemed the most logical to themselves.
Ultimately, looking deeper into ourselves through self-awareness can help us take a better view of other people around us and it will help us also better understand our place in the world. Once we begin to recognize the power of our mind and align ourselves with our ruling principles, we can grow in ways that help maximize our lives and the lives of those around us. Marcus Aurelius recognized this, and practiced self-awareness to help improve his life and the life of others.

Finding a Role

Posted on by jabittan

In James Harmon’s collection of advice letters, Take My Advice, Dr. Laura Schlessinger writes, “Your role is to find out what your purpose is, and to face it with nobility, integrity, and courage.” She writes this after explaining that the meaning of life lies with our relationships and services to other people, and it is not hard to imagine that Dr. Schlessinger would consider everyones true role to be to find a way to make valuable contributions in the lives of others. Dr. Schlessinger follows her quote up with the idea of each person recognizing their importance to others and the universe, and each person finding a way to improve the universe one small action at a time.

In this sense, Dr. Schlessinger is bringing forth a new idea for each person finding their passion and mission in life. For me it has become trite to hear others talk about finding a true passion and using it to create a career. The problem is that not everyone has a strong business sense to monetize their career, and many people simply have a passion that they enjoy as a hobby and not a career. Deciding that you must be passionate about something, and that you must profit from that passion can ruin what it is you enjoy, or misguide you towards something that you merely enjoy but do not fee truly passionate about.

The advice that Dr. Schlessinger offers combats this idea of passion, because for her, our role is to find those who we can serve and discover solutions to improve what it is we dislike about our world. The end goal in finding a purpose according to Dr. Schlessinger is to become passionate about leaving a positive mark on everything, so that the world is better after you have passed through it. She removes the pressure from monetizing your passion, because we can always do something that will help improve the planet, and we can always live with the idea of helping others before ourselves.