Applying 'Deep Time' in a Single Human Life (the 'purpose' question)

My Time?

When I wrote about deep time, I had in mind planetary time, or longer, a sense of timelessness, where ‘time’ is a construct of human consciousness and there is something that exists outside of human understanding.

The idea of time as ‘infinite’ perhaps?

But these are contemplations rather than the reality most of us live in and, most days, I find myself in much more practical conversations,

How shall I live?

How do I make the most impact with my one short life?

Will I ever achieve what I set out to achieve? Should I even bother??

Pretty common questions I find, for those of us who want life to mean something beyond our experience of it, who see systemic challenges and believe we can make a positive contribution, no matter how small.

Time, and Choice

I was in conversation with a friend who asked one specific question as we discussed the ‘state of the world’ over a virtual coffee.

No matter what I do, how is it possible for me to transform X system?

My first reaction was curiosity because he did not work in the system he was talking about.

We were ‘chatting’ as I saw it, a coffee conversation, rather than a coaching conversation. An exchange of opinions and anecdotes rather than anything that would lead us to action.

I pointed this out to him, because I think it’s easy to look at the ‘state of the world’, and feel helpless to do anything about it.

Do you want to? Do you have a desire to create change there, or are you observing?

I didn’t want to pre-judge, maybe he was having an epiphany about what to do with the rest of his life? It felt helpful to check in.

I too have those thoughts.

Many of my friends are active in climate-related work for example, important stuff, but it doesn’t feel like my priority right now, I prefer to support those who are the action-takers, to enable them to make better choices and take bolder actions and to empower and equip those around them to do the same.

While I know this might change, and that my idea of direction only exists as I write it in this moment, it’s also true that, in this moment, it feels clear.

Purpose?

And that question, ‘do you want to?’ can also be experienced as a,

How can I not?

Sometimes we find ourselves doing things because we don’t feel we have a choice, because it feels like there is no alternative, or we arrived there who knows how.

I was curious for my friend, how it looked to him,

Perhaps you have noticed a fork in the road? Which is the path you want to take from here?

I don’t mean to make this holier-than-thou; I don’t hold to the notion of a ‘life purpose’, that seems ego-driven, coming from a need to make meaning out of what we are doing, from our anthropocentric perspective.

And yet, why would we not take the road that inspires us, assuming it passes some standard of ‘first do no harm’?

In My Life?

My friend acknowledged that, in fact, he did not want to move his commitment to X area, he was expressing a ‘state of the world’ observation, an opinions, or perhaps, something in the future not yet germinated.

His question was also, though, about about time and relative change.

How can one person possibly make a change in a huge, seemingly immovable system?

Yes, this is also something I feel, and something I’ve countered in myself,

How can I possibly know what is possible? Is that a reason not to try?

I was in South Africa when Mandela became president. It seemed like an historic moment, back in 1994, one that had a certain inevitability the closer the time came, but also one that would have looked unimaginable, or only imaginable, a few decades before.

It’s a clichéd example, I know, partly zeitgeist, certainly not the achievement of a single man or woman, but it was something to point to in my coffee conversation with my colleague.

How do you know what is achievable?

Maybe those ideas of achievement are distractions? At best they are only ideas, a direction to orient ourselves, not a career path laid out in full colour powerpoint.

Maybe you can change the world? Or at least your small part of it.

Maybe humans are destined to repeat the terrible patterns of the past as my historian son would tell me.

Maybe our planet will implode with the weight of greenhouse gases in the coming generations.

Or, maybe, you can have a positive ripple in your small circle is small, and your immediate connections go home to their connections and the positive impact spreads.

I have no idea which of these may play out, if any, but, the more important question I think is,

Do we have to make sense of the future in order to decide what to do in life?

So, it seems to me, helpful to hold this longer time horizon, both on an individual, and a humankind perspective.

I can’t possibly know what’s ahead, I can only aim in a direction, continue to read my tea leaves, and land where I land.

With love,

Cathy