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At 67 the most important thing in my life is my family, friends and dogs. I had a rewarding career and I have went out of my way to help others my entire life. Some were long term commitments such as babysitting for 2 years to help a single mother finish her college degree or more recently helped a terminally ill couple stay in their house together for a extra year. Along with accomplishments were failures such as divorcing 3 husbands. No regrets as there are no guarantee in life. I am also grateful for my good health.
"Good life" stuff that I have and am grateful for: My employment situation is stable and very good, I have enough money to handle my needs and stay on top of my obligations. I am married to a man who loves me, and I love him, he is a nonviolent person and brings no unnecessary stress into my life. No one who dwells in my home makes me tense or upset. I have filled my home with things that resonate with me, that bring me comfort and enjoyment. My young adult sons, well...I kept them alive to basic maturity and they have not been arrested, so...it could be worse. I've had the chance to live in some interesting places and I've met a lot of interesting people, and I have enjoyed some exciting experiences and I've got great memories and cool stories to tell.
Goals I intend to do: I need to quit smoking and get in better habits of exercising, I want to be debt free (though at least I no longer have high interest debt, nor do I have any trouble making the payments, and my credit is good...I just want to knock out the balances)... And I would like to eventually own my "forever home." And I would like to have enough of a financial cushion to travel more, but I am holding off on all that until the debt is gone. I realistically expect all of that to happen within the next few years. I want to write a book and make more art, to leave something of my story behind for my descendants. I want to spend more time with my friends and family, including those who don't live nearby.
Grandiose dreams & wishes (unlikely, impossible, or outside of my control)...This stuff isn't "I need in order to be content with my life" it's more "if it happened that would be so awesome." Wish list stuff.
My custom built forever home has exactly the art, style and architecture I dream of, and although I live in the forests of the Rocky Mountains near Colorado Springs (in this fantasy), I need fear no wildfire. Everyone that I care about (and my cat) is in excellent health & happiness and all of my relatives are totally functional and self supporting. I find the work that I do fulfilling and not boring and I have enough money that I never have to worry about if there will be enough for anything that I want to do. I buy lots of art, hoard books, go to the theater, museums, talks, classes, whatever I want whenever I please. I go on beach vacations with small groups of close friends and/or family at least once a year. I entertain visitors who never try to take advantage of me or overstay their welcome.
Heck. While I'm at it, I'll dream up an end to hunger, racism, bullying, poverty and cruelty and suffering, wish for a healthy planet and world peace, and that none of my favorite products had ever been discontinued. Also that Hollywood would never again try to remake a classic that was perfect the first time around, and would instead do more screen adaptations of cool book series instead. And teachers would be the most dedicated and well paid professionals in all the world. And no one uses "upspeak" or ever answers a question like, "How's it going?" with an answer like, "It's Tuesday!"
If your version of the good life is specific, I'd like to hear about that too. For an example I just invented - "Make over $150,000 a year and live in a 3 bedroom house in Vermont with a partner and 2 children."
To the contrary, the less specific - the better, at least philosophically (relative to the Forum). Socrates believed wisdom is the path to happiness by way of expanding one’s mind/consciousness i.e. the good life is filled with knowledge/learning (and experiences/love, from my perspective). That said, educational pursuits often lead to lucrative careers; and realistically, money is a significant factor as well i.e. no one lives on love alone.
I was growing up through poverty and war. Thus, my philosophy of good life for me is to have enough money to live a pretty comfortable life, by working hard and smart, being frugal, knowing how to spend, save and invest wisely from young age. I don't want to be poor, but I don't care to be too rich either. I understand money is important, but it's not everything. I know how much is enough for me for now and my old age someday (I don't want to think about the old age much yet, I learn to be mindful, to live one day at at time). Good life to me means to live a simple, clean and meaningful life. Simple means I don't care much about luxury and lots of materials; someday, when I die, my children may not like my stuff, and that means I leave a big mess for them to clean up - I don't like that. Clean means I don't do anything illegal and harmful to others. Meaningful means to be kind and helpful to others. I don't care to be filthy rich, popular and famous. I care about peacefulness.
Last edited by AnOrdinaryCitizen; 04-04-2022 at 09:07 PM..
If you can, start with a loving and steadfast base. If you don't have the right materials, you need to go to the store and find the right ingredients for a loving base. No need to pull your yucky first start with you unless you think you caused it. If you're not sure of the ingredients, be sure to ask the numerous store clerks....while realizing some are newer than others.
Once you have a base in your pan, think about where you want your pie to rise to. Plan it out and raise the base. It helps to have a raised pan to reinforce your crust, as a solidly planned crust will help you from taking your great fillings from oozing into a complete mess.
Next, pick a flavor of fruit you'd like fill your pie. There's no right answer, but it helps if you pick one fruit. It will help share your faith and beliefs with others who see your pie that you stand for something. Mixes and foundationless fruit mixtures also have tasty moments, but it's that core fruit that can help give a lens for us to all understand what is in the making.
Before adding the fruit, you will need to try and clean the filth off of it from outside. This can be washed off obvious impurities. Next comes the harder work of preparing the fruit for use. Make sure to make eating the pie simple by cutting fruits into bite sized pieces, and make the extra effort to remove the skin/peel. For the clever, these removals can sometimes be made into pretty garnishes later.
Now it's time to season your fruit. Make your fruit nice for everyone by adding sugar to every bite you can. You can also use other additives you learn about like cinnamon or spice. You don't want to go overboard on any one ingredient, but a unique and balanced mixture is always in style.
When your fruit fill is ready scoop the filling over the top of your base. Try to leave no surface uncovered. With that practice in, you can continue scooping the base in to fill in your crust. Don't worry about running out of filling. It's amazing how filling content can fill any container.
Finally across the top, you can choose what type of crust your filling, base and sides are going to support. It could be a steady fill across all, not revealing much. It could be racing criss crossed stripes that contain the filling and reveal it to many. Just make sure you have enough hole to allow your filling to breathe....or it may get bottled up under pressure and spill out uncontrollably.
Finally, you need a place to heat your pie. Heating the pie allows all of the goodness to blend together until such point as one cannot eat a piece of the pie without tasting the entirety of the pie. A pie must be true to itself. It will not please all, but it will be grand to please those who are looking for that type of pie. Heating a pie takes a long time. As it heats, it will rise up, darken to a golden brown and grow a bit brittle. Trying to change a fundamental shape too late will only break the pie, so be ok with how your pie is. Do not over or undercook the pie. When a pie is done, it must be removed to cool. Do not be too anxious to take a pie out early either. Simply enjoy the transformation in anticipation. Enjoy the smells, and check on it on occasion.
With your pie out, remember a pie can be too hot at times to be enjoyed by others. If this is the case, allow it to cool in a window sill from time to time to allow it space. The window above may offer a reflection of the pie, but most can see a pie at this point and get an idea of whether or not they will want to eat it.
While one doesn't want to cover a pie's very nature, small garnishments can be added to a cooled and cooked pie. Care should be made to ensure the additions are those that would be good for the pie to be enjoyed by others.
Finally, our pie is ready to be enjoyed. A good pie will divide fairly in all of its pieces and is often even better when paired with ice cream or creme. From the pie will spread little parts for various guests to enjoy. In the meantime a good pie will bring people together for good conversation and laughs. It should not leave people hungry, but filled. If on occasion, while enjoying a good piece of pie you find the ocassional pit or seed, do not chastise the chef. Rather, enjoy what is on hand and put the imperfections to the side.
Finally, as the sun sets, and the pie is reduced to crumbs, a good pie will wash away easily from the pan. It allows the ideas of the conversation to continue with an easy wash of the pans, leaving behind no unwanted residue that could affect future pies negatively.
For this thread, I'm defining the "good life" as the kind of life that an individual may dream of living.
What kind of life is that for you?
...
Note this thread covers similar themes to another thread "Have any of you written a guide to living well." However that thread is referencing a guide to living, while this is referencing the end goal of living life (whether or not you achieve that goal).
....
What about you?
I have never dreamt about living a good life so there is no 'end goal' for me. However, I think that I have lived a good life throughout all the ups and downs phases.
I can not define the specific details of my 'good life' in any material, emotional, psychological or physical terms.
For me, to have a good life, one must be contented and grateful.
Being contented does not mean being self-satisfied, not striving or not setting goals. It's simply means you are happy being who you are, what you had done and are doing. It's very much similar to what defined by ohio peasant: "The first essence of a "good life" is an emotional balance, a kind of acceptance or adaptability.".
Being grateful means appreciating of what you have. Gratitude is important for one's emotional health. It helps with your assessment and connection to others (family, friends, community) and the world around you (nature, history, the universe etc.). Having gratitude helps you to be optimistic, seeing the world as the half-full glass, finding silver linings in the dark clouds.
Whether I have made any positive contribution to the world or others is up to others to decide. A good life for me has love, companionship, relative comfort, things to keep my mind interested in. That's about it.
Whether I have made any positive contribution to the world or others is up to others to decide. A good life for me has love, companionship, relative comfort, things to keep my mind interested in. That's about it.
BIB - Yeah I agree with you, but this is how I think of it. I have my values that I can use to judge my effect on the world, and seek to make a positive contribution by that lens. Equally I understand my lens is not the one true objective lens, and I may well be wrong. I understand that the world may not always champion the values I live by, particularly after I am gone, and that is fine. The 2500 world may find some of my actions immoral in ways I haven't even thought of, and that is fine. The 2500 world is for the 2500 people, I do not expect them to live by my 2022 values.
So really I am not huge on the idea of legacy. I'm very much in the que sera sera, whatever will be will be camp on that. My future legacy is not for me to decide, I do not own the future memory of me - that belongs to the people remembering.
BIB - Yeah I agree with you, but this is how I think of it. I have my values that I can use to judge my effect on the world, and seek to make a positive contribution by that lens. Equally I understand my lens is not the one true objective lens, and I may well be wrong. I understand that the world may not always champion the values I live by, particularly after I am gone, and that is fine. The 2500 world may find some of my actions immoral in ways I haven't even thought of, and that is fine. The 2500 world is for the 2500 people, I do not expect them to live by my 2022 values.
So really I am not huge on the idea of legacy. I'm very much in the que sera sera, whatever will be will be camp on that. My future legacy is not for me to decide, I do not own the future memory of me - that belongs to the people remembering.
I find it a really freeing mindset.
I try to act and think in ways that make me feel good about myself. Whether others share that view is probably a crapshoot.
I don't care to be filthy rich, popular and famous. I care about peacefulness.
There’s nothing ‘filthy’ (or evil) about wealth in and of itself nor does it automatically translate to a ‘lack of peace’ if one has it. It doesn’t guarantee (or detract from) a good life; it’s all relative to consciousness.
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