What is the secret of life?
If you ask people this question, you will get such interesting answers.
At a recent family gathering, I asked someone whose birthday it was, now that you are a year older, what is the secret of life? And he responded, to do good work. At work, he’s been there longer than the new people and they’re still learning things that are down pat for him. He needs to balance how much he dedicates his time to helping them vs. how much he dedicates his time to taking care of his responsibilities. The more he can train them to be problem solvers without being a drain on senior staff, the better off his company is. Independence is good, he says – the ability to figure things out. Yet if everyone’s working completely independently, and don’t meet, then they don’t get the communication they need in order to do their job well. It’s important that they understand the task definition enough – what people need from them. So there’s a certain level of communication that helps people join together to create helpful things for society as a whole. To him, the secret of life is to be a good contributor for society and there are certain characteristics that help a person to be good at that. These characteristics are often learned on the job.
Other times I’ve asked family members what is the secret of life and oftentimes they are not sure how to answer that question. They feel put on the spot. They feel like even if they are much older and wiser than me, they still don’t know. Hmm. They must have wisdom to pass onto me, I’ve thought. How come they don’t believe they have it?
Others feel that studying religion can get you closer to the secret of life. This is an area where spirituality is considered on a mass scale over large periods of time and through this, wisdom emerges. Yet others feel that religion is full of things that they can’t seem to get themselves to believe.
Others feel like the secret of life can be revealed in science. For example, another family member pointed something out to me that I found fascinating. As humans, we use our senses to understand the world we live in. About 80% of our perception comes from the sense of sight. But there’s a whole wide range of frequencies on the electromagnetic spectrum and some of the shades of light aren’t even visible to the human eye. Infra red or ultraviolent rays for example are not visible to humans. But they are to some other animals. In other words, we really don’t know what we don’t know. He said that our whole understanding of the world is in our imaginations.
The secret of life can be related to what we find most important in life. Such as health, happiness, or knowledge. What do you find important?
I feel that the secret of life is to make the most of the time we have, as in the Latin expression, Carpe Diem. We don’t know how long we will live, but while we’re living, we can do our best to: enjoy life, share our joy, be helpful, inspiring, caring, comforting, creative, kind…
What is the secret of life, to you?