What’s In A Life?

Born as we are with no conception of why, with no idea of who we are, where we are, or what it is all about, when we come to our senses we have a lot of stuff to work out. What the circumstances turn out to be, of necessity, gives us clues as we go along. We draw conclusions, rightly or wrongly, from the position we find ourselves in. If we are born in Africa, or India, or China, Europe or America, the place can make a world of difference.

If we are born to an single mother in a slum or to the daughter of a member of a ruling class in an ordered society, makes all the difference in the world. If we are born in full possession of our faculties it can make all the difference in an ordered society or no difference at all if we are born into a world of chaos.

If we have parents who value your life and are eager to invest in it, our prospects are much brighter than if we constitute a burden for parents who are already overburdened in their struggle for personal survival. And yet, we see parents, often mothers, who rise, even so, to the challenge. If we have parents who see in our new lives the validation of their own, we have a fighting chance to make the most of what we have to give. If we are born into a society that recognizes that we, its children, are the stuff of their future and, therefore is willing to invest blood and treasure in that future, then we will have a better chance to play our part if we choose to do so.

Isn’t it remarkable that in so many cases things turn out not too badly for so many people? It is not surprising that in many cases things do not turn out well at all. In the process of growing up in the environment chance has offered each one of us, we will suffer hurts or slights. Some damage will be done. So many of us have unseen wounds accumulated in this process, yet we manage to make a creditable contribution within our family circle during our lifetime. Some of us, in spite of all disadvantages, may even manage to accomplish things that contribute positively to those in our wider circle. Given the variety of human natures there will be some of whom that cannot be said.

Then there is the realm of our personal interrelationships. Did the family wherein we were spawned remain a bulwark of material and emotional support throughout are lives? Or did we whirl away on an independent trajectory and form a separate core of our own? Did we cast off family fetters as we proceeded through our lives? Did we form intimate relationships that stood the test of time? Were we blessed to maintain longstanding loving relationships that sustained us? Was there, will there be, anybody still there when we find that age and/or situation may have stripped us of any power to make the things that we prioritized still happen?

Each one of us makes an accounting of how we are doing as we go along. Are we reaching the goals we hoped to reach? Is there something we have yet to do to reach a goal we have set for ourselves? Don’t we worry sometimes regarding what other people may think of the contribution that we are making, that we have made, during our lifetimes?

Thinking individuals cannot escape their own accounting of what they are doing, what they have done, with their lives. To ourselves it is very clear how circumstances far beyond our control may have prevented the full realization of our dreams, dreams others may have counted on us to realize. After all, so much in the area of chance and circumstance has dictated events. So we often forgive ourselves our failures. I

In the end, how do we see ourselves in the march of history as our period of contributions draws to a close?

Have you been thinking of any of these things?