Becoming

A young friend was sharing with me recently that she had decided that she no longer wanted to pursue a career in Corporate America, and now wanted to become a social worker. Of course she realized that she’d never become wealthy pursuing such a career, but she clearly felt “called”, and I was impressed with her passion.

This young person will likely truly “become” a social worker of some sort. Who knows where life will take her as she defines herself with this calling, but there’s little doubt in my mind that she’ll follow a path defined by who she’s become, and that the path she follows will be defined by her heart and soul.

In the event that she lives to be 100, will she look back across the years of her life, and say that in her life, a social worker is what she “was”?

How do we define our lives, in the context of our whole life? When you’re 25, it’s easy to think of this year and next year, maybe even the next 5 years. When you’re 50, it’s easier to think of the last 20 years, and the next 20 years.
In the world within which our ancestors evolved, a context of a year or two was really all that mattered. A context of 5 years was a long time, and 20 years was a lifetime.

But today, the context within which we define our lives has changed a great deal. We live a lot longer than our ancestors did – our lives today might span 2 or 3 of the lifetimes of only a few hundred years ago. We’re blessed with lives of relative luxury, with a great deal of time to reflect, and meditate, and re-create. In our lives today, when we come to the end of the path, and face the clearing at the end of life, (to borrow a metaphor), how will we measure and define the life and the path that we’ve traveled?

Will my young friend look back and see the life she lived and call herself a social worker? If she’s lucky enough to travel a path that’s long, and lives to a ripe old age, I suspect not. Even if she works for many years in the field, and does many good things – in the tradition of so many great souls in this world – there’s a pretty good chance that she won’t define herself that way.

I have a good friend who spent 40 years in Corporate America as an executive. He’s been retired for several years now. Each year I notice that the way he refers to himself when he meets people evolves a little bit. When he first retired, he introduced himself as a retired executive – not necessarily in those words but that was the gist of the description. Today, he introduces himself as an outdoorsman who hunts and fishes and cycles. Depending on how deep into the discussion he gets, he’ll eventually get around to the part where he spent 40 years in Corporate America, and retiring as an executive.

But that’s not who he became. After only 10 years of retirement, he’s no longer that thing that he spent 40 years becoming. For 40 years it probably seemed important, but now as he looks back along the path behind him, it was only how he spent his time – it wasn’t who he became.

I had the enormous privilege of spending a couple of hours with my grandmother the other day. She’s 101 this year. She believes that she’s nearing the end, and she hears the clearing at the end of the path calling to her. I believe her, and sitting with her, I hear a little of the whisper that she must be hearing. It’s hard to say goodbye, knowing that the next time we meet will probably be beyond that clearing that calls to her today.

But she’s smiling and happy as she looks forward. She feels the comfort of the clearing as it calls to her, and she’s had enough of the trials and tribulations that a 101 year-old body puts a person through.

We talked much of the wonderful life that she’s had. We looked at old photos again, and she could tell me who all the people were in the photographs. Friends she’s known all her life, grandkids and greats and great-greats, even the spouses. It’s astounding to listen to her tell about the day that a particular photo was taken, and who was there, and what they were celebrating, even though the photo was taken in the ’20’s or the ’30’s.

There’s joy and gratitude in her eyes and in her voice as she looks back down the path behind her, and there’s wonder in her eyes as she looks forward to the transition and the clearing that she’s approaching.

She was a hard-working young woman, a bride and wife, a mom, a grandmother, and a friend. She became an old woman with bright eyes, a warm heart, and a beautiful soul. Nowhere in the resume that she lists today are any of the “jobs” that she held to make money. Oh she remembers them and can tell you about them, but they weren’t who she was, and certainly not who she became.

I’ll miss my grandma when she makes that next transition, when she makes that final crossing in this life, when she “becomes” yet one more time. I hope I’m still learning from her, and taking care about what I want to become in this life.