I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day. E.B. White
I love E.B. White’s humor, but I’ve often wanted to shout at him: “You think a day is hard! What about planning a life?!” At this week’s interfaith dialogue meeting (the Council for Religious Understanding or CRU), we talked about what it means to you, your family, or your tradition to lead a worthy life. How do you balance the desire for happiness or comfort for yourself or your family with particular religious commandments or duties, and with religious or secular values that might call you “to do justice and love kindness” in the world around you? Is there a “worthy balance”?
Of course, each of us wrestles with this question in different ways, depending on our situations. While it feels like a bigger question in college, most of us keep wrestling with it all our lives, wondering if we are striking the balance as we should. And sometimes we can feel stuck, overwhelmed by the options—or lack of options.
With so much happening in the world, this past summer was such a time for me, so it was helpful to be prompted by Associate Chaplain Iman Jafri’s Reunion reflection to watch the movie Frozen II. One song contains the wise line (proving that wisdom is indeed found in many places!) that in difficult times, “All one can do is the next right thing.” The next right thing is different for each of us, but for all of us, it is important just to take that next step in our worthy lives.
If you ever want to talk about how you do the next right thing on your own path, please do reach out to any of us chaplains.
Blessings on planning your day!
Carolyn Fure-Slocum, College Chaplain