We Are Far Too Great To Just Survive

My Instagram has become a greater source of strength and writing inspiration for me lately. Elephant Journal, Goalcast, The Good Quote, Mindbodygreen, Conscious Good, P1440, the list goes on as this content fills my feed with beauty and wisdom that feed my soul everyday and give me the ideas to fill my ever wandering philosophical brain.  The content we take in matters and helps create our mindset. I have been searching for my truth for as long as I can remember, which is a long time, because my earliest memory is peaking through my backyard fence before the age of two, loving the smell of the wood, getting splinters in my nose and wondering when the neighbors would be awake so I could go across the street, and now I’m 43.  Without getting too “neurosciencey” on you,  I have learned that our sense of smell is closely connected to our ability to make and retain memories. I also remember the smell of the fresh cut grass the day I walked around the school yard, apologizing to a real friend that I had said something less than kind about, out of my own insecurity and desire to fit in. So, considering all of this, you can see I’ve been in search of my truth for a long time and always feeling just a little on the outside of “normal”, a concept I’m letting go of these days.

Maybe the gift of midlife is that we have been around long enough to compile all of these memories into stories that help us see understand and reveal our truth. We relish the good days, taking in what we appreciate and are grateful for in life, and in the tough times, we  learn about our real strength and the mindset that it takes to survive.  Based on my experience, both are equally important.  Today, across my IG feed came this quote:

“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive.” – Dalai Lama

This quote struck me because of a conversation that I’ve had a few times with a well meaning friend about the difference between needs and wants.  Her contention is that there are only three human needs: food, water and air.

“Not in the life that I want to live,” I reply, as I begin to  rattle on about Maslow’s hierarchy, which I do believe is relevant, but then quickly transition to how her contention applies to my own life.

I need much more than food, water and air, and, while I am willing to agree that American life is full of a lot of things we don’t necessarily need, there are many intangibles that I know are necessary in my life…because I don’t just want to survive, I want to contribute and be a vital part of humanity.   It’s on the back of connection, love, the ability to be vulnerable (or a safe place to land as I prefer to call it), and our blessed gift of freedom that I build my strength…intangibles I so desperately need in large supply.  It’s through this beautiful quote though that I recognized the disconnect that my friend and I are experiencing. She is referring to human survival, I am talking about the survival of humanity. Without the bond of humanity, we eat, drink and breathe, but our mere existence, without the gift of our humanity leaves our world in dire straits.

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