"be in this place." pt. 2: on being and becoming

"it's my life. it's now or never. i ain't gonna live forever. i just want to live while i'm alive. it's my life. don't you forget. it's my life. it never ends."


"i fly with the stars in the skies. i am no longer trying to survive. i believe that life is a prize, but to live doesn't mean you're alive."


perhaps you can identify these 2 songs that are separated by a bit more than a decade and a couple generations...if you can't it's no big deal...i just want to parse a couple sentences--or at the very least point them out to get you thinking and hopefully get you to weigh in on 'em...can you guess which ones?


i'll give you a minute to read back through...60 59 58 57 56 55 54 53 52 51 50 49 48 47 46 45 44 43 42 41 40 39 38 37 36 35 34 33 32 31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1...


got 'em?


i just want to live while i'm alive and to live doesn't mean you're alive.


i just want to live while i'm alive implies that being alive relates to existence, while wanting to live relates to wanting to experience life. so, i just want to experience life while i'm existing.


to live doesn't mean you're alive implies that just because you're in a state of existence in no way guarantees that you're experiencing life to its fullest. so, to be existing doesn't mean you're experiencing.


so much for not being redundant with this idea saying the same thing, said differently :-) at any rate, what both songs capture and convey is that living and being alive are existence and experience oriented. "no kidding," you're thinking...one says, in essence, i want to experience while i'm existing. the other says, existing doesn't mean you're experiencing.


eleanor roosevelt said, "life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. one must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life." in other words, existence and experience go hand in hand. life was meant to be lived. life was meant to be. it was meant for being. oprah had at least one good thing worth repeating, and that's "live your best life." that kinda sums up what i've said so far...thanks, oprah :-) 


there's a related idea going on here, which i've already written about in pt. 1, but here's a brief nod to part 2. the idea is that of being and becoming, and the forces of process and progress. all of these words illustrate existence and experience. the above songs could have easily been written as "i just wanna become while i am being," or "to be doesn't mean you're becoming."

new brunswick's latest initiative for encouraging population growth is the "be...in this place" campaign. the population growth secretariat's website portal provides information on immigrating and settling, living, working, studying, and doing business in new brunswick, boasting that nb is a place where you can be fulfilled, be successful, and explore your passions...where you can be yourself, celebrate your culture, and experience other cultures...where you can be part of a vibrant community and a growing economy. bottom line, it's an invitation to live, exist, and be...it's an invitation to be alive, to experience, to become...

the way i see it, life, living, and being alive are about more than just 'making the best of a situation,' or just 'dealing with the cards you've been handed.' it's not about just surviving, settling, or being resigned to a state of stationary stagnance. it's about embracing challenge as an opportunity to grow. it's about being active. it's about being dynamic, not static. it's about getting your game face on or setting your face like a flint--whatever expression you want to use--and throwing yourself into becoming your best you...your most authentic you...your most fulfilled, successful, explorative, celebratory, experiential, vibrant, growing you...your most alive you...


life is your invitation to be. to exist. it's your invitation to become. to experience. how alive you are depends on how you throw yourself into living. and how you live depends on how alive you want to be. consider life your invitation to be in this place...this place called life...

just live it.

ps: i just started sartre's being and nothingness. expect a part 3 once i work my way through the over 800 pages of dense, yet delightfully literary philosophy :-)