I've had this fantasy about watching my own memorial service and seeing what would be said and done there. I think it's just really important to me to feel like my life has been of some lasting value, that I made some kind of difference here in how I lived my life and how I affected the people I touched, and one way to see if that was the case would be to see what people would say about me after I'm gone.
We're all familiar with the concept of a will, in which a person's material possessions are passed on to those designated. But much of the time, what's most important about a person's life has little or nothing to do with the material wealth or possessions he/she amassed. For the vast majority of people, after a generation or two whatever money was passed on has been spent and forgotten, and whatever possessions were bequeathed have also either broken down and disappeared or have been passed along to others to whom they have nothing but superficial material value, if that.
To me though, the life lessons that people learn, the wisdom they acquire, and the love they became and shared are what are really most important and most enduring. So how can those be passed on too so others can also benefit from them?
The concept of an ethical will is becoming more popular in recent years. It's basically just a way for these other less material "assets" to be passed on to whomever may benefit from them. If you Google it, you'll find that there are all sorts of websites and companies that will help you craft an ethical will, some of whom want significant amounts of money for that service. But most of us are probably completely capable of producing our own ethical wills without any such help. In fact they would seem to have the most value when they're drafted and presented in the person's own hand and by the person's own mind, with no wordsmithing or template-adhering influence by others in the process. Authenticity is the key.
I've sometimes wondered why I created this blog at all and why I continue to put time and effort into it. And now that I've been exposed to the concept of the ethical will, I think that's basically what this blog is for me. It's a way of preserving and passing on the things that I've learned, the perspectives and life lessons and truths that are most important to me, and the things that I think others can most benefit from.
I know that for me personally all my life experiences and lessons can be most meaningfully viewed from the perspective of oneness or connectedness, so that's the primary focus I've given this blog. I still strongly believe that we're all here ultimately to grow in a sense of connectedness with God and all of life. That's a pretty broad concept though, which allows me to then offer all these various posts along that general theme.
So for those of you who can benefit from any of what you find here in any way, I offer past and future posts as my way of sharing what has come to be most valuable to me. I'm grateful for the opportunity to simply be alive now and experience all that I have, I'm grateful to be able to be of whatever service I can to each of you in this wonder-filled adventure we call life, and I'm grateful for all that so many others have shared which has enhanced and influenced my own experience here.
January 23, 2010
Where There's a Will...
January 22, 2010
Li'l Nuggets O' Truth
I believe there's truth and wisdom all around us. We each have our own little knothole on the universe. By combining all our highest, clearest visions of what we see through our respective knotholes, we can create a much more complete and accurate awareness of the nature of life. So I've created a separate blog to present a collection of quotes that I've come across that seem to offer valuable perspectives on different aspects of life.
That blog is at http://tomstruthnuggets.blogspot.com/
Please visit and enjoy, and send any quotes you'd like to share with me to the address provided in that blog.
January 19, 2010
Wordplay
"Atonement" - per Webster, is reconciliation with another, where reconciliation is the act of renewing frendship with on one level, or taken to the extreme, becoming one with again. So the act of atonement is really an act of "at-one-ment" whereby we remember and embrace once again our true connectedness with another, be it God or a friend or whomever. The act of overcoming past differences, past separations, is driven then by a deeper desire to return to our true nature in relationship with another, which is one of connection.
This suggests that we're naturally in a state of connectedness with others. That state can be disrupted or overshadowed though by a commitment to some difference or conflict that we think we have with another. One effect of that conflict is to make us feel separate from the other. We may even question whether we want to continue our relationship with that person on the basis of the difference and the sense of separateness that we feel. Lovers may choose to end relationships when the blissful feeling of total connection with the other is shattered by some conflict that inevitably arises. As life plays out, suddenly or gradually in situation after situation we lose our sense of connection and replace it with feelings of separateness.
Atonement happens when we choose to practice true forgiveness, or when we're able to look past the surface details of a situation and remember our true nature, which is one of continual connection to all others. Atonement is always about reconnecting with the other. It's always about putting differences aside or forgetting them altogether and focusing once again on our true connectedness to each other in spite of any outward or surface differences we may have.
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