We all try to do the best we can in this life. The truth is our lives can become routine. Behind every tired smile at the grocery store, every short temper, every quiet act of kindness, there is someone carrying a weight we don’t see. We make choices with incomplete information, with old wounds and limited energy, and we call that doing our best. It is not perfect, but it’s normally sincere, and sincerity counts for more than we admit.
Most days we live unaware of this life while we are inside it. We wake, we work, we answer the phone, we worry about bills and what to make for dinner, and the hours just slip by out of habit. We rarely stop to notice the air coming in the window, the way light falls across the kitchen table, or the fact that we get to be here at all. The present is so close to our eyes that we miss it, like trying to read a book pressed against your nose. Someone once said life happens while we are busy making plans for it.
And we live equally unaware of the next life, whatever we believe that next life to be. For some it is heaven or a return, for others it is memory living on in children and friends, for others it is simply the mystery of what remains after we are gone. Because the next life is unseen, we file it away for later, for when we have more time or more courage to think about it. Yet that unawareness shapes us too. It makes us cling tighter or let go too quickly, it makes us postpone forgiveness and gratitude as if we have an endless supply of tomorrows.
Perhaps wisdom is not about solving either mystery, but about holding both in view at once. To remember, in the middle of an ordinary Tuesday, that this day is both fleeting and enough. To do our best not out of pressure to be flawless, but out of respect for the brief chance we have to be kind, to be useful, to be present. If we cannot be fully aware of this life or the next, we can at least be gentle with ourselves and others as we try. That gentleness might be the closest we ever get to understanding both worlds.
“And we know that God works all things together for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.” – Romans 8:28
Being About The Journey 