We think that accomplishing things will complete us, when it is experiencing life that will.
Interpretation
True fulfillment comes from experiencing life rather than merely achieving goals.
This quote by Mark Nepo highlights the distinction between the pursuit of accomplishments and the value of living fully in the moment. It suggests that while we may believe that achieving our goals can lead to happiness and completeness, true fulfillment arises from engaging in life's experiences and appreciating each moment as it comes. Thus, the essence of life lies not in the destination but in the journey itself.
In practice
In a motivational speech about the importance of appreciating daily experiences.
Four hundred year old trees, who draw aliveness from the earth like smoke from the heart of God, we come, not knowing you will hush our little want to be big; we come, not knowing that all the work is so much busyness of mind; all the worry, so much busyness of heart. As the sun warms anything near, being warms everything still and the great still things that outlast us make us crack like leaves of laurel releasing a fragrance that has always been.
Whatever difficulty you face, there are time-tried ways you can listen your way through. Because listening is the doorway to everything that matters. It enlivens the heart the way breathing enlivens the lungs. We listen to awaken our heart. We do this to stay vital and alive.
Let's be in awe which doesn't mean anything but the courage to gape like fish at the surface breaking around our mouths as we meet the air.
Water reflects everything it encounters. This is so commonplace that we think water is blue, when in fact it has no color.... But the water, the glorious water everywhere, has taught me that we are more than what we reflect or love. This is the work of compassion: to embrace everything clearly without imposing who we are and without losing who we are.
The further I wake into this life, the more I realize that God is everywhere and the extraordinary is waiting quietly beneath the skin of all that is ordinary. Light is in both the broken bottle and the diamond, and music is in both the flowing violin and the water dripping from the drainage pipe. Yes, God is under the porch as well as on top of the mountain, and joy is in both the front row and the bleachers, if we are willing to be where we are.
We work so hard to get somewhere, to realize a dream, to arrive at some destination, that we often forget that though some satisfaction may be waiting at the end of our endurance and effort, there is great and irreplaceable aliveness in the steps along the way.
It was an indulgence, learning last words. Other people had chocolate; I had dying declarations.
The point is not to take the world's opinion as a guiding star but to go one's way in life and working unerringly, neither depressed by failure nor seduced by applause.
Every 10 years or so, there was a moment when I'd say, even subconsciously, 'Is that all there is?' You've got to find ways to keep it fresh for yourself.
Like a French poem is life; being only perfect in structure when with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.
The part of life which we really live is short.
A lot of people would have loved me to keep singing... You come to a point where you have sung, more or less... your whole repertoire and you want to get down to the job of living.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.