I spent some time hanging out and working with those in 12-step recovery programs (e.g. Alcoholics Anonymous). While I was always amazed by their stories and the journeys to where they are today, what really struck me were the systems they had in place to keep them on the path to recovery.

I learned that recovery really boils down to honesty.

Specifically, being honest with yourself.

Often, they would joke with each other that if you were having trouble sleeping at night, to do a thorough step four. It took me a bit to understand what they meant, then I realized they were referring to step four on the twelve steps to recovery:

Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

Step five takes it further with admitting the exact nature of your wrongs, which leads to step six where you stand ready to have God remove all the defects of character. These are ridicuously tough steps, not just for recovering addicts, but for all of us.

However, I can’t help but think if we all took the time to commit to a thorough step four, being truly honest with ourselves, how much further along we would be as people… and as a society.

To say the last two years has uprooted all of us would garner an award for the most obvious observation of all time.

As businesses closed their doors, workers adjusted to new environments and spiritual centres were unable to accommodate the community aspect of their faith, we learned just how shallow some roots of society were… and how easily our deepest rooted traditions depended on the richness of the soil. And now, here we are figuring out where to go from here.

We need roots again, but, we need them in better soil.

Just as we’ve done before, it’s time to build something deep and long-lasting. How we do it is the question of our age.

As someone who spent years dancing around issues and avoiding uncomfortable conversations (while simultaneously loving being in uncomfortable and unfamiliar life situations), this little tidbit resonates so well.

While tough at first, having those uncomfortable conversations eventually leads to a place of greater comfort in life—and learning.

It also puts you in a definite position to really know the people you surround yoruself with, especially those closest to you.
It builds that relationship further.
Or sets it free, saving both parties the heartaches that will eventually come.

They’re tough to have, but each one is worth it.

What if there was a community dedicated to bringing out an entire repository of human knowledge, for free, to the world?

Everything you’ve ever wanted to know.

This was a pipe dream thirty years ago and yet, here we are today, freely able to access Wikipedia. An astounding feat made possible by the generosity of a worldwide community, dedicating countless hours to give us articles with an astounding 99% accuracy rate.

It continues to give while never relying on the advertising model that plagues every media site.

More importantly, it has shown the world what generosity can do when that idea is at the forefront.

If only we could try this more often.

Marcus Aurelius

… and I think that’s it.

It would be nice to extend this list, but I have my serious doubts.

There is a saying that we live two lives and the second one begins when we realize there’s only one. Intellectually, I get the message, but always feared the real meaning might come a little too late.

Time is passing faster than I could anticipate and while I’m doing my best to slow down, appreciate what’s in front of me, I know tomorrow I’m going to wake up and it’ll be ten years later.

So, I’m doing my best to live my second life.

There are no do-overs, but I can approach each day as if I’ve already lived it… and will do better this time than last.

All the joys and pains of life come in the challenges it lays before us. These are always met in one of two ways.

The first is to accept the challenge head-on and find pleasure in working through it, conquering it and learning from it, ultimately growing as a human being.

Each new challenge is an opportunity to tackle the vicissitudes of life.

The second is to admit defeat upon its presentation, complain endlessly and sulk about it, ultimately getting nothing done to change the circumstance (or even the attitude towards it).

The second way accomplishes nothing while the first changes the world.

“He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.“

Friedrich Nietzsche

In re-reading Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning,” there was a passage that struck me in a different way than my first time through. That was when Frankl mentions the death rate of prisoners increased over Christmas and New Years.

Not because the conditions were any different, but because many prisoners assumed they would be home again by that time.

When we lose all hope in any tomorrow, in any future, in anything that life expects from us (not necessarily what we expect from life), we see the decline of ourselves.

It’s for this reason, we must hold steadfast and live with hope in our hearts. It may be the only thing that can keep us going.

Many moons ago, I wrote this article for Lifehack about perfect being the enemy of completion. While it revolved around a mantra of Ready, Fire, Aim, I’d like to come back to it for a moment and simplify it further to something I heard recently:

Better, not perfect.

Moving in the direction of better, even just a little, is a significant improvement over overthinking perfection and doing nothing.

For instance, I swept the floors.
Are they spotless? No.
Are they better? Yes.

I subconsciously took the same approach with my own writing, always striving to do a little better each time, but never expecting perfection from myself. Looking back at my work over the years, I can be proud as it was the best I could do at the time. However, each time I sit down, it’s just a bit better.

We can easily extrapolate to the problems of our world.

Can we do better?

Yes? Then let’s do it.

It won’t be perfect, but at least it’ll be better.

Are all marked by moving goalposts.

While it’s extremely difficult to find happiness when you’re suffering, especially with physical ailments or environmental factors, happiness markers seem to always be something in the distance.

Always moving, always changing and just when you get close, they move again.

I, for one, am skeptical of petty quotes on social media or glorified discovery stories that pervade pop culture that point us in the “right direction.” These are nothing more than personal journeys marked by deep hurts and dissatisfactions a person is trying to get over.

They’re also over-simplified and leave us in a ditch that we can never recover from: comparison.

It’s pretty clear the world will never be perfect and life will never be exactly where we want it, especially considering our idea of a perfect world and perfect life are constantly changing.

However, that shouldn’t stop us from taking steps towards making it better in our own way. And for that to happen, we need to set our own goalposts and move them on our own accord.

Otherwise, our understandings of happiness will always be callous, unattainable and fleeting.