Dear friends,
Looking back over life and change,
The question occurred to me this morning,
Was all the work and worry worthwhile?
So I decided to share some thoughts with you in this reflection.
But let's begin by taking a pause and coming to a stop just for a few moments.
We need to give ourselves an opportunity to come into presence so we can more easily reflect.
So take a moment to settle into a comfortable position.
Bring your attention to your breath and allow it to find its own natural rhythm.
Simply breathing in and breathing out in awareness.
A one-minute pause now to help us come into the here and the now.
Welcome back.
I'd like to invite you to look back,
As I did this morning,
To what you might call the vanished worlds of your life.
We've all had them,
I'm sure.
Those organisations that felt at the time like the centre of the universe.
The projects that kept you up working late,
Waking up troubled at 3am.
The all-important meetings,
The pressing deadlines and the worrying crises you carried home with you.
At the time,
Those things had so much weight.
They seemed to call out,
This matters,
Give yourself to this,
And you did.
You gave your energy,
Your loyalty,
Your worry and part of your life.
As I looked through some old photographs of Dublin in the last couple of days,
I was reminded of the passage of time.
Did I actually live and work in this city?
It seemed like another world.
Not only from the last century,
I'm talking about the 1960s,
But it could have been from the 1860s.
It was a reminder to me that time does what time does.
It moves on relentlessly.
The company I worked in moved on.
I saw the building going up,
And I saw the building going down,
And now going up again.
Transformed beyond belief.
Triggers like this remind us of once important projects now finished or forgotten.
New people arriving,
New ways of doing.
Suddenly,
The realisation dawns that things which consumed our minds for years feel almost ghostly,
Otherworldly.
If you have ever experienced memories such as this,
You might find yourself asking with something of a heavy heart,
What was it all for?
I can't remember who it was who suggested that the wording for his tombstone would read what was that all about?
It's possible to feel grief,
Uncertainty and even fatigue maybe,
When we look back on a lifetime of projects and ask ourselves what has become of them?
Because we humans tend to look for meaning before we can put our hearts into something.
Our comfort and our consolation lies in remembering we live in an impermanent world.
Everything changes.
In fact,
The only constant,
If you could call it that,
Is change itself.
So what about dedication in this world of constant change?
That's something that we will reflect on after another one minute pause.
Impermanence doesn't make our dedication foolish.
Think of how a meal is temporary,
But the enjoyment and the love experienced by having a meal with others is something of permanent value.
A kind deed is performed in an instant,
But the kindness can be remembered for a lifetime and not only by the receiver,
But by the giver.
What happens is we very often confuse what you might call the package with the value.
The job was the package.
The committee was the package.
The title was the package.
Packages such as jobs,
Committees,
Titles,
They aren't meant to last forever.
They are just containers that hold things.
Things like kindness,
Justice,
Learning,
Dedication,
Commitment and community.
And they hold these things for a little while.
The package may break apart.
It may change beyond recognition.
But the value which we have invested in it,
The dedication and the commitment which we have exercised,
These all remain with us when the package is no more.
So the question which arises as we reflect back,
What was I really dedicated to?
Was I dedicated merely to the survival of a committee?
The company?
The movement?
The title?
Or some planned future?
Or in this busyness,
Did I manage to find myself dedicated to something more enduring?
But even if we failed in terms of having worked with a higher enduring motive,
This reflection today offers us the possibility of a different approach in the future.
We can find comfort in realising that we were learning how to care,
How to demonstrate reliability and responsibility.
Maybe we were working to improve the status quo,
Working to help others,
To offer people the happiness of a job well done.
Maybe we were just working because we had to,
We needed the money.
And in respect of committees and voluntary work,
Maybe we were seeking some sense of belonging,
Wishing to be part of something,
Hoping to be accepted as capable of making a worthwhile contribution.
And surely there cannot be any harm in those lesser motivations.
Looking back,
Can we reassure ourselves by realising that nothing done with positive intention has been entirely wasted?
Yes,
The jobs,
The committees,
The organisations,
They may have changed or disappeared.
But none of these were meant to last forever,
Even though at the time they seemed to us to be of fundamental permanent importance.
In all of this,
The souls of each of us have been trained and trained in the art of dedication and commitment.
Our hearts have been educated in kindness and cooperation.
Our hands and minds have learned and practised skills beyond our dreams.
And finally,
You and I,
Someone who worried,
Laboured,
Organised and carried responsibility,
We have become someone new through all these acts.
Is there a lesson for us in all of this?
I think there is.
We learn to work with love without possessiveness.
Just think how a parent raises a child who will eventually leave.
A builder repairs a wall,
Knowing that the rain will eventually wash the wall away.
We fall back on the frequently repeated words,
This too shall pass.
You and I live in a world of constant change.
We must never forget this.
It has its pluses and not only its minuses.
So we can give everything we have to the moment,
Without having to believe that we're working on something permanent.
Dedicated work,
Reliable commitment,
The love and concern offered,
These are all acts worth doing right now and they don't need the support of permanent structures.
What about the past?
The past work?
The past motivation?
While we are looking back,
We must forgive our younger selves.
Not so much for thinking,
Why did I care so much?
Why did I lose sleep over that?
At the time you had to care and at the time it felt appropriate to lose sleep.
But maybe a greater source of our regret is the idea that at the time we did not realise that what we were doing had a value in itself,
Which would outlive the organisation or the committee or whatever.
But even so,
No worries.
It's easy as they say to be wise after the event.
The younger version of you and I,
We didn't have the wisdom that comes with years of reflection and experience.
In all probability,
We were responding to the urgency of the moment as best we could,
Hopefully with a sincere heart and hopefully leaving something of value behind us.
And what about the future?
Moving forward,
We remain more positive than ever.
The knowledge that nothing lasts is not a reason to stop caring.
It's a reminder to care,
But maybe with a lighter hand.
We can still show up.
We can still work hard and we can keep our promises.
We must.
But we do this in the quiet knowledge that this too is a temporary arrangement.
I'll give myself to it while it's here.
But I won't get lost in the idea that this is it.
The mistaken idea that this will last forever.
The important thing for us,
For you and for me,
Is that we try as best we can to always be a person who can be trusted.
Someone who can work without needing applause.
And an individual who can let go without bitterness.
Namaste.
