The terror of a life not well lived

Living a life in parentheses.

"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

~ Mary Oliver

The Shepherd’s Dream ~ Henri Fuseli (1786).

Of late, I have been having these pestilent dreams, visions that cling to me upon waking, of potential realised, of failure subsumed under the victory of my ambition. In these moments of astral navigation, I am Walter Mitty reimagined, a paragon of dashing humanity, a being that seizes life by its horns and bends it toward something worthy.

Then I wake. I sit in the horror of what is. The shadows of morning light creep across the room and I am simply…ordinary. I rise. I dress. I move through my tasks, but I do so with the pale echo of that dream self. The one who dared. The one who acted.

And you… know this feeling too? Or do I overstep, daring to presume that you, too, wake or end the day with this drought of being?

Now, let me be clear: I do not mean only the familiar sorrow of lives unlived, of paths not taken. What I would like to talk about is something more acute. It is the difference between living any life at all and living a life that you or I would be proud of— a life that, when it is time to meet the ferryman at the river’s edge, we would offer up a coin without shame. A life that would feel like true payment for this chance at being here at all.

I would like to give you context, if you will permit me. By all accounts, I am an average human being, and for the longest time I didn’t mind my ordinary existence. I am not particularly audacious; in fact, for much of my remembered life, I have played it safe. I sullied the dance of my authenticity trying to fit into boxes that others made—boxes labeled responsible, practical, good. I have moved through life as one might move through a well-lit museum, observing it all from behind the rope, admiring the daring of others but never quite stepping over that threshold myself. And for all my misgivings, I let sleeping dogs lie.

I cannot recall exactly when I decided that this existence became something less than— a notion to mock, a matter to be cast aside by the sands of time. I no longer bite into the marrow of living like I did as a child or as a young teen on the cusp of everything. If I could describe my life presently, it is like Jenga, stacks being removed piece by piece. These stacks, surprisingly, are rooted habits— behaviours recycled, repurposed every day— until what once seemed novel turns out to be another symptom of wasted living.

I will be honest and say that I am tired. Tired of inhabiting my body like a stranger. I have long felt the tremor of something that no longer allows me to stand mute. I have grown weary of clapping fervently for the brave, while my own hands remain uncalloused by the work of daring. It is no longer enough to admire. I want, at last, to become.

So what is left then? What remains for one who has watched and waited too long? The temptation, of course, is to despair: to believe the stacks have been pulled too far, that the structure will inevitably tumble, that there is no rebuilding what was neglected when time was more forgiving. But I reject this. I must… because to despair is to insult the very gift I have been given, this one wild and precious life.

What is left is this: to act. To step, if only once at first. To defy the drudgery of comfort. To risk the embarassment of stumbling as I learn how to dance again, authentically, without choreography written by others. You and I must fashion a life that feels worthy of the river’s coin, not a perfect life, not a grand life in the eyes of the world, but a life, at its close, we can meet with swelling pride.

Each step begins small. A word spoken when silence would have been easier. A choice made for passion rather than propriety. A day claimed for ourselves rather than surrendered to mindless routine. And another. And another. Until one day we look around and find that we have crossed over—not living in parentheses, but living the lives we once only dreamed.

So I ask again: What will you do with your one wild and precious life?

As always, dear readers, keep safe and stay golden,

Yours in winding thought,

Christine.