Bucket List

Ontological Mystery: Gabriel Marcel wrote that all too often as humans we define ourselves --our identity, value -- based on what we do, our routine, various roles or functions we are assigned or assign ourselves to.
Who am I?
a student
someone who likes to sleep in but lately gets up before 8 (early! ...for me) every day
member of several faith sharing groups
a thesis writer


there is a routine to my day, an expectedness, this structure is good and helpful, as long as I remember that whatever my routine is is not a definition of me.

and there are other functions i assign to myself: the organizer; the connector. Especially this last one can be very limiting to me in my relationships with others, that in my desire to bring other people together, I forget to include myself in that.

and this is the mystery -- ontological (the word about being). The Mystery of Being is that I am not a sum of parts. There is more. I be. And there is something intrinsically good and important and valuable about that BEING -- and the way that I be is different, unique just to me -- and it is from this core am-ness that my identity flows, that determines my worth and value as a person being.

and this is not to completely discount what i do and my various roles and functions and routines. That surely those too are part of me, and part of a manifestation of who I am, but the thing that is easily lost is that it is just a part.

but how is this mystery? well...who are you? try making a list of you that doesn't include what you do. and then how do they come together.

I asked my philosophy professor... well what if I forget about the things I do in how I think about myself and think only of that being part? his answer: we live in a very physical tangible active world and everythign arround us brings us back to : you are your successes and your failures, your schedule, your function, your routine. This, actions and do-ings, are what we see of one another. and so constantly we are brought back to ourselves in terms of functionality.

hang on to the mystery that there is more.

what does this have to do with a bucket list?

i was thinking about the Rilke quote:

"... and the point is to live everything. "
in context, he says to be gentle with unresolved questions in the heart, to not seek answers that couldn't be lived, because the point is to live everything, live the questions now.

but that one line "and the point is to live everything" has been reverberating around me this past week. To live everything. To take risks. to not live in fear-- i guess that's what i thought of first.

and it makes me think: what I haven't i lived, and silly enough, but some of the first things that come to mind are things like: drugs, gotten drunk ... And I'm pretty happy with that, though it seems like I skipped the stereotypical high school experience -- and maybe college for that matter. and i wonder how much of that was done out of respect for my body and how much out of fear. and are both reasons legit? "Do not be afraid" is a common theme throughout the new testament, do not be afraid to be to live, but some fear maybe is legit and self protective.

and then... what do I want to live before I die? And I thought of the movie the Bucket List.

But the truth is there isn't a list for me of things I want to do before I die. but if the list were about HOW I wanted to live. Yes, there is a list for that.

I want to live dangerously. And while the first thing that may come to mind with that statement is a motorcycle and tatoos (though that's pretty cool) or extreme sports, that's not what I mean.

I mean I want to live un-comfortably, in a way that is continuously putting me in contact with reality. Relaity buzz word from my El Salvador program. What I mean is I want the world: pain suffering hardship hand in hand with joy hope love faith generousity. I've written about this before, but the hard and the joyful are inherently connected and to truly live there must be room for both. So that means living at risk: living in a way that is open to pain and deep hurt that can puncture the protective walls i sometimes desperately try to throw up around myself. It is those some puncture wounds that let in (and maybe sometimes even bring) deep joy hope.

Living dangerously-- loving wastefully, as a friend once said. To approach both myself and those around me with this wasteful, this deep appreciation of our BEING.

This is a being (this ontological mystery) that is the core of humanity and no where is this seen more clearly than in the presence of those who are different, who live and speak and think and approach life differently. WHo have been wounded in ways I could never dream of and yet... and yet we, them and I, we share this being in common.

Living dangerously because to appreciate my being does not mean that I must protect myself from hurt. Appreciating my being (my creation -- which begs the question of a CREATOR)means not reducing myself to a function, to means constantly striving to be toe person I am created to be -- that I am a being in progress and to live in that knowledge, seeking to be faithful to that which is my core identity. And like anything else, faithfulness takes discipline and dedication and commitment because it won't always be easy, it will be hard, there will be people or events or situations that will challenge me, that will hurt me, that maybe will make me want to curl up give up on living into myself. Christ is a perfect example, right? He loved his created being -- who he was and who he was created to be -- so much that he stayed faithful to the end, which meant his death. Through such constant and faithful appreciation of Himself, he died, when he could have denied his being (his created being) and avoided the pain, saved His life.

To live dangerously. To love wastefully.

and maybe, just maybe, i'll get a motorcycle and tatoo some where along the way.