February 12 | All Life is Being Lived

We are, for better or for worse, hardwired to dream of potential.

Even more than that, we’re hardwired to live in terms of our failed potential—all the little sins we’ve committed against ourselves, coming between us and who we could have been. All the things we know we could have done to do and be better. Like we’ve burned the blueprints of a better life to stay warm for another night. 

It’s in the light of the morning we could look around and see: sidewalks. Houses that are not ours. Cars we’ve never driven, and never will. Hundreds of mailboxes full of thousands of letters, and this is just one street in one neighborhood of one city in one state of one country in one world. 

Our potential? Well, it’s mostly informed by what other people have done and are doing. 

Which is to say, it comes from what is and was more than it comes from what could be. 

It also means that someone else’s potential, their dreams, might actually stem from what you currently and presently are.

So for today, put the world of potential to rest. Think instead, in the words of Rilke: all life is being lived. 

All life is being lived in dramatically different ways and places,

All life is being lived in strange and often contradictory ways,

Because all life is being lived by all those living. 

We draw our potential from each other. All life is being lived. … Read the rest