Things I Have Learned:
Given our different natures and environment, what I have learned is not likely what someone else has learned. Still, the question begs an answer: What is life really about? Early in life it is about learning how to stay alive and communication. In youth and our productive years life is mostly about excitement. We are attracted to excitement, we thrive on it. Finally, in our terminational years we seek contentment, not excitement.
When all is said and done, what is life really about, what do we really seek? Perhaps it boils down to contentment. Early on we think contentment will come via learning, then excitement, love, power and wealth. I don't know if there is any kind of genuine test that can measure personal contentment. But contentment is the goal all of us seek to achieve, while maybe what brings contentment varies. It starts with the realization that human intelligence has limitations, that our comprehension of life is limited.
At any rate, the goal of life is contentment. So it boils down to what factors generate contentment? Good health is necessary for contentment. Those who understand the importance of good health early in life are more likely to be content in later life because they protected their health. Ethics may not be as obvious, but I put ethics right up there if one is to be contented. An appreciation of nature I put here also because we are all a part of nature, and if we cannot appreciate this aspect of our life, we cannot be content wallowing in ignorance about our earth's environment. Tolerance of diversity, or rather the appreciation of diversity, is a key factor affecting our level of contentment. A more complicated factor is the extent to which one becomes dependent on others for contentment.
Finally, one needs to reach some objective understanding of one's self. Self evaluation is crucial. You can make mistakes about others, but failure to understand yourself is fatal to contentment.
Personally, I have never been as contented as at the present time. The puzzle, for me, is basically complete. Of course time is running out, but I don't really fear the end, however far off it may be. If I can manage to control my own dying process I am home free. But let's look at the individual factors which determine the level of contentment a person achieves.
The health aspect is obvious and needs little enlightenment. I always am amazed at how many intelligent people run outrageous risks with their health. But discipline seems a real wild card in our genetic makeup. To complicate things further some people are real disciplined with certain aspects of their life and loose with other aspects. I suppose we can always blame it on someone's lack of willpower, but that implies we all start on a level field with 'willpower'. There is no evidence this is true. As is so often with our strengths and weaknesses, a good amount of luck is involved----good or bad.
Ethics is a more interesting factor of contentedness. I have, over time, rejected the notion that we learn ethics from our inherited religious scripture. Rather, it now seems obvious to me that inherited religious scripture can be used in a positive or negative way to bolster our inherent understanding of right and wrong. Organized religious sects can be used to strengthen our resolve to do right instead of wrong, or they can be used to justify wrong. It is always too easy to justify wrong actions and beliefs if we can convince ourselves it is "God's will". Every crime and unethical practice imaginable has been committed under the umbrella of God's will.
There are two basic tenets to my understanding of ethics. First, the inherent human understanding of right and wrong is the Golden Rule: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." All people everywhere understand this unless they are psychopaths and just lack this capability. This simple universal concept is the basis for almost all ethics. Any deviation from this is simply wrong. My second adopted tenet over time is that when you skirt the Golden Rule by using scripture or rituals or prayer or sectarian dogmas and traditions to do wrong---when you do this, you cannot be a contented person. How many of those on the religious right of any religion---the so called purists---are happy campers in life? Whenever they express themselves about issues you can feel the heat of their anger towards their targets. What radiates most from these religious purists is their deep sense of intolerance to human diversity. I don't think it is possible to be a contented person when diversity is not seen in a positive light. If there is anything that stands out most from God's created evolutionary process it is diversity. When one opposes this diversity, and disrespects this diversity, one is out of alignment with the very process which generated our own existence.
Thus, to my way of thinking, contentment can only come from two aspects of diversity. First, one needs to genuinely appreciate and welcome diversity. Second, one needs to defend and protect those victims who are persecuted or given second class treatment or subjected to character assassination by those with little tolerance of diversity. To accept and defend diversity is to be content. To do otherwise---to reject and attack---is to be discontented.
Appreciating diversity does not give anyone the right to break the Golden Rule. All diverse races, cultures, religious groups, political groups, social groups, etc. are all still bound by the Golden Rule. After that they are free, free as all should be to have diverse personalities, diverse beliefs, diverse political notions, diverse cultural dress, customs, etc. When Barack talks about our commonality I interpret this to really mean the Golden Rule. That is the human commonality when it comes to ethics. And ethics is one of the kingpins for contentment.
All of us exist in earth's environment. We can, and often do, try to elevate ourselves to some sort of special place in the evolutionary process, creating an image of God which gives us dominion over other species, license to abuse natural resources, and direct personal connections to God. This, to my way of thinking, is a big mistake. You are just setting yourself up for endless frustration when God 'betrays' your trust and things don't go your way. Of course then we invent all kinds of explanations for this betrayal: God is testing us, God works in mysterious ways, all will be for the best in the end---and the end, if necessary, will be Heaven as a reward for any torment you may suffer during your life. Of course each person is entitled to beliefs which at least conform to the Golden Rule. But believing in an image of God described above does not very often generate contentment. Rather, it is very frustrating. And certainly if God was personally on anyone's side, good things would happen to good people and bad things to bad people. If reality tells us anything, it certainly debunks that notion.
I don't know how often, if ever, God tampers with evolutionary laws, the laws which have driven the process for millions of years. I don't know how many times, if ever, God answers any prayers for Him to interfere. We certainly know that many times he certainly does not entertain the best of prayers or protect the best of people from the laws of evolution. The evolutionary process is brilliant and good in the big picture. The more we understand the nature of this process, including the randomness involved, the better we can accept any 'bad luck' in our lives. Humans, at this stage in the process, have the ability to create a certain amount of good luck and avoid some bad luck. Size once dominated the earth. Now 'brains' dominates the earth but alarm bells are going off from all directions that our brains might be our downfall. The notion that God likes or favors us over other species is at best an assumption. I happen to have liked all my pets over the years. I liked them a lot. I am not too receptive to any notions that my pets can be mistreated in any way because they are not as elevated in the evolutionary scale. When humans mistreat other species I find it hard to believe God is amused any more than I would be amused if my pets were being mistreated. I mean, go ahead and chop the head off of any pet I have had and see if I shoot you. For me, spending time alone in nature, or at the very least in nature with someone you are really close to, helps me bond with the evolutionary process, and keep a lot of things in perspective. All the gadgets and creations by humans pale in comparison to the complexities, beauty, and wonder of nature. Mother Nature is our reality of existence. For me, separation from nature is a disaster for my state of contentment. Imbedded in nature your thoughts and feelings are the purest and clearest and it is then that contentment settles in the most. I love nature and am saddened to see what humans are doing to it. If what we are doing to nature is not wrong, nothing is wrong. If overpopulation and the subsequent abuse to nature is not wrong, nothing is wrong.
Successful relationships with others contributes to contentment. But too much dependency on others is seldom a good thing. When a person becomes dependent on others for contentment----literally dependent on others to the extent others gain control over his/her contentment---this is most often a mistake. It is a mistake because relationships are rarely etched in stone. People change with time, people relocate, people die, get divorced, or friendships end. When this normal pattern of life occurs and bonds are broken, the basis for contentment should not be lost, and if it is lost, the relationship in the long run failed. No matter the depth of the relationship, it should not be the end all sort of relationship, or future contentment becomes endangered. When you depend on others for contentment you have lost control over contentment. This is not to say others do not contribute to contentment for they certainly do. The trick is to not let too much of your own contentment depend on others.
To me, we all die a little bit when relationships end---whether the relationship be human or a pet. Kids are going to leave the nest, adults often get divorced, friendships end, pets die, people die. Those who build everything around such relationships have nothing left to sustain contentment if they end. "What am I going to do now?" is not a dumb question. But the question should have been asked from the start. These kind of relationships are bonuses, the icing on the cake, but never the substance upon which lasting contentment endures. All the death do we part nonsense is ignorance of human nature. Of course 'till death' may happen, but even then, at some point, one is left alone when the other dies. Each person becomes independent of personal relationships their own way. Often the best marriages are those in which this independence is evident. The choking kind of relationships are unhealthy from a mental standpoint, and they are quite risky. Someone or both are going to pay dearly at some point in time. The end of relationships does not have to be catastrophic in nature, nor do they have to be seeped in blame. This has nothing to do with the depth of sadness at the parting. It is idiotic not to understand the magnitude of the loss, or value the good it brought to your own contentment for the time it lasted. Genuine relationships are good, whether short or long. Genuine relationships contribute to contentment. These genuine relationships can occupy brief periods of your day or long periods of your day. They may only occur in spurts or on planned occasions. Let's put it this way, one should not put all their eggs in one basket. If he/she has no identity outside of the identity others give to him/her, he/she can never be consistently contented. The smaller one's world the least likely any kind of real contentment for any length of time.
Buddhist philosophy states: "Listen, if you accept something it never becomes a load; the wound is not carried. Remember one thing: Anything incomplete is carried by the mind forever. Anything complete is dropped. Mind has a tendency to carry the incomplete things in the hope that some day there may be an opportunity to complete them. You are still waiting for the wife to come back or for the days that have gone." It is hard to be content if you cannot let contentious relationships drop and move on. Tippy-toeing around each other in any kind of relationship ensures endless annoyance and frustration for both. Again Buddhist philosophy states: "If you expect permanency in a world where everything is impermanent, you will create worry. Anything that is born is going to die. Birth implies death, so it is okay, nothing can be done about it."
The God created process of evolution moves on, not as we dictate (especially in our own personal lives), but as the evolutionary laws dictate. Humans have the ability to affect some aspects of our personal lives, this is our gift of 'freedom', and some of us use this 'freedom' better than others. Life is an opportunity wrapped in a good deal of luck (chance) and the goal is to maximize contentment under our individual circumstances. All of the above is just my own interpretation of how contentment is reached.
