Better Verbs

Right now you are choos­ing words of action to describe life to your­self. As a mat­ter of habit, you are prob­a­bly choos­ing words of com­fort­able mis­ery or a com­mon view­point. You can choose dif­fer­ent verbs and expe­ri­ence a vari­ety of other feel­ings. The option is yours. Expand your list. Erase the neg­a­tives and opt for the mys­te­ri­ous or more pos­i­tive terms of action.

Life is what we make it by descrip­tion. Per­son­ally, I choose verbs that reflect the para­doxes of life. There are many con­tra­dic­tions in life. I can spin them as com­edy or tragedy. I can never remem­ber to carry Kleenex, so I spin them as com­edy. One might as well laugh as cry. Both expres­sions are a release from irre­solv­able ordeals. When I can­not change some­thing, I sim­ply inte­grate it into the comedic meta-story of life.

All of this arises by see­ing my life (through a healthy imag­i­na­tion of faith) from the side­lines. I am a player in the ball­game of life and an observer at the same time. You would not believe some the bril­liantly stu­pid plays I have run. They looked good on paper, but the end result…

I watch oth­ers in their list of life-verbs. They are pretty con­sis­tent. Some are saints. Some are bul­lies. They both have a favorite set of action-views. I pre­fer the first to the sec­ond. Inspi­ra­tion beats irrel­e­vance any day.

No one knows what will hap­pen today, but we are already aimed toward our cho­sen ways of describ­ing the events. You might as well kick back and enjoy the show. If you think it is pri­mar­ily about you, that is your first mis­take. Some­thing big­ger is going on, and you can­not describe it with any verb, adjec­tive, adverb, or noun.