Is That All There Is?

At Noah’s fourth birthday party, dad led the singing of Happy Birthday with enthusiasm, perhaps too much enthusiasm. Then all the parents cheered as though their team had just won the World Series. Then, as soon as the kids resumed playing, their parents’ enthusiasm immediately vanished. It felt like the enthusiasm was manufactured.

It’s understandable that we’d manufacture enthusiasm to preserve children’s delight with life but it made me wonder how much we manufacture enthusiasm to hide our disappointment that there isn’t more to our life than our modest contributions at work, our not-always-so-good family relationships, that kitchen remodel, the upcoming vacation of beaches, cathedrals, monuments, and shopping, let alone the home team’s “big” win.

Is that all there is? Should we aspire to more?

For example, should we strive to make a bigger difference in the world? Most of us can’t or are unwilling to do much more than we already do. And even if we tried really hard, the world’s needs are so great that our efforts would likely constitute the mere picking of a few weeds and planting a few seeds in a massive forest. Would additional effort likely make a person stop wondering, “Is that all there is?” Perhaps. Perhaps not.

Should we aspire to devoting ourselves more wholeheartedly to family members? Considering the enormous effort even adequate parenting requires and of how many people suffer because of a spouse, parent, or other family member, it's unclear that focusing more there will make one stop wondering, “Is that all there is?”

Or perhaps we should strive to be more creative—write, paint, perform, propose new policy, whatever? That would seem to make only a relatively few people stop wondering, “Is that all there is?”

For many of us, maybe it all comes down to accepting that all we can hope for is to make lots of small contributions in and out of work and--to everyone--be kind where you can, tough where you must. Could that be all there is?

Even if that's so, maybe that’s enough.

Marty Nemko's bio is in Wikipedia.