third tm speech...not yet delivered

The timeless and eternal and maddening questions veer between “what is the origin of life?”, “what is the origin of conciousness?”, “what is the origin of the universe?”

On one side of the eternal debates sits the great physicist Steven Hawking, who denounces God as the creator, claiming everything can be explained through the lens of science. At the other end, are those other folks who will disavow Darwin and evolution entirely, choosing to believe in the biblical origin of things….having faith that the earth, as per Genesis, is only about 5000 years old, folks who think all was crafted by the Lord in 7 days….folks who spend there spare time shooting caribou from helicopters and thinking they can see Russia from their own back porches. And then there is Douglas Adams who tells us the answer to everything is 44. Maybe he’s right. But I digress…
I maintain that the truly great questions can never be answered. In fact, they were never meant to be answered.


I maintain that the truly great questions can never be answered. …maybe were never meant to be answered. I say, screw all of those questions….to hell with them….What I want to know is something far more mundane, with real-world value, and based in reality. How should I, in the practical sense, face this called life?

I’ve got three lines of thought on this question…

Number One- idealistic….…this is an inward, internal line of thinkgin:
When I was very young, I was sent to a roman catholic parochial school, I was comforted by the line from scripture that tolds us that “The kingdom of God is within you”. It was an idea that felt right and peaceful to a child, this concept that connected the heart and the soul to something larger…connected to everything really, the entire universe.. A harmless, soothing, yet empowering thought: “the kingdom of god is within you”. I ask again…How should I face this thing we called life? Maybe this was the approach that we should take in facing life’s hills and dales..By knowing that everything is interlaced, interdependent, and that everything, even God, is resident inside each of us….we can become more accepting of all that comes our way. Heeding these words, living these words, “the kingdom of god is within you”……We place a high value on everybody and everything…respect for all….But isn’t believing that God is within you a tad self-serving perhaps? Bit of a reach? Feel insignificant and irrelevant 90% of the time, and the other 10% I’m feeling merely adequate. It’s really tough to truly believe that the kingdom of god is within you, like, 24/7.

Number Two - practical…this is an outward, external line of thinking….:
a few days ago, my wife and I noticed a large tree, close to our house, that was starting to tilt a bit. It made us uncomfortable, like it might fall onto the house….so I decided that this old tree needed to come down.

But as I approached that tree with my chainsaw humming…a sadness struck me….I considered all of the living things that call this tree there home, conscious or not and I considered for a moment the monks in Tibet who are very careful where they step, for fear of injuring some underfoot life form…an insect, a blade of grass.

I came to my senses, realizing how ridiculous this line of thought was, and cut down the tree. The alternative being to let it stand and maintain its life-giving role to all the little varied varmints, but incur the risk of it falling onto my house and killing us all. So I ask again , how should I, in the practical sense, face this thing we called life? …Maybe rational, direct responses and quick action to all that life throws at you are the answer? On the other hand, this might be a thoughtless, aimless way to proceed with ones life….collecting paychecks, and eating right, and chopping down threatening maple trees.

Number Three, the middle path?:
New age philosopher Eckhart Tolle teaches the age old Buddhist idea that the answer is now. Stop focusing on the past, and the future, all there is is now, this moment. This is the only thing that is real…this immediate slice of time…starting….right….now!

…we are only truly alive when fully investing ourselves in the activity of the moment, whatever that might be, listening to a piece of music, striking a tennis ball, delivering a speech, listening to a speech, cutting down a tree, drinking an ice cold been. That moment and the effort and energy we put into the moment, are all we really have…all that anyone ever has. In a very real and literal and meaningful way, there is nothing else…except now. So I ask once again , how should I, in the practical sense, face this thing we called life? The answer could be this: Live your life one glorious moment at a time.

Now is the great equalizer…the great and the small, the good and the wicked, saints and sinners, all share this single moment….with no one holding an advantage over the next person.

Jesus has this same moment that Alexander the Great and Constantine did,. and Francis Bacon, and Kevin Bacon, Obama and Bush. DaVinci and Michaelangelo, and Attila the Hun…Churchill and Hitler, Lincoln and Jefferson Davis…Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson and Greta Garbo, Morgan Freeman and James Dean, LeBron James and Derek Jeter. All in the same space that you and I are inhabiting right now, right at this moment….hear it is…it’s gone…there is is again! The shared state of humanity, the common denominator that holds all of us, all things, the universe, together…is….now. Maybe adjust in a frame of reference, but never-the-less….Now.

An 11th Century Sanskrit lyric from young Kashmiri poet closes .with a passionate homage to the sacredness of the present moment….

Even now
I know that I have savoured the hot taste of life
Lifting green cups and gold at the great feast.
Just for a small and a forgotten time
I have had full in my eyes from off my girl
The whitest pouring of eternal light ...

And then there this 21st century piece by eleven year old Noah Van Hook, who wrote in a 5th grade weekly paragraph assignment his own ode to life and the moment. It’s often said that children live more in the “now” than older folks….not jaded by the twists and turns of life….He writes:

Life is many things. Life is huge. Sometimes just 10 minutes is a long time! Life basically lasts up to your 80s! Sometimes more! Life is good. You know those shirts that say “Life is Good”? They are completely right. Life is suspenseful. You know those times when you just worry and worry and worry and…..Life is Beautiful. It’s just a work of art, isn’t it? Life is Random. You never know what it will throw at you! Life is Sad. Dying, pain, broken hearts…Life is confusing. Life is complex. I have headaches just thinking about the massive structure of life. I could just keep on writing but this is supposed to be a paragraph. Well…that’s it!
Thus concludes Noah….
And so I will awkwardly conclude this screed, A long monotonous speech , by conceding that there are clearly no clear directions on how to really live, how to get the most out of your life…., not now and not on the horizon. And I will go one further and admit that It is really really difficult to live and the now, and I’m not claiming to be even marginally successful at doing it thus far… There always and forever will be much greater truths about to be revealed….leaving us with matters still very much open-ended and unclosed…. But it is an undeniable, unassailable, not to be refudiated, stone cold, lead pipe cinch of a fact that ……..Life is a magnificent and miraculous never ending series of spectacular , madly entertaining, “Nows”
Finally, perhaps, Here is Thoreau…..“What we now see as the truth is just an indication of a much greater truth to come. The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star."