Last Friday we started a group at The Spark of Hudson on “How to Live a Good Life.” Despite announcing it only a couple of days earlier there was terrific turnout with almost twenty people attending. The motto of The Spark is “Learn Together” and in this spirit we will be exploring this challenge as a group.
We started this first session with two reflections. The first one was to imagine yourself at the end of one’s life feeling deeply content. Where are you? Who is around you? How have you lived your life that makes you feel so content now. The second reflection was to imagine yourself on an airplane the next day and the airplane suddenly starts to fall out of the sky. What goes through your mind? What do you wish you had done differently? I recommend these reflections. People often find these easier to carry out in a group than on their own.
For each reflection we had our eyes closed for a full minute before writing down what came to mind. We then shared as a group. It was really moving to hear people seeing themselves in their homes or out in nature at the end of their lives. Sadly in the US fewer than 1 in 3 people die in their home with the majority instead passing away in hospitals or nursing homes/longterm care facilities. Also many people see themselves surrounded by friends and family with only a couple saying they pictured themselves alone. Uniformly the answer given for feeling contented was to have lived a good life in a moral sense. To have done right by other people. To have lived with integrity. Not a single person mentioned wealth.
For the second reflection only a couple of people firmly assert that they would have no regrets. Everyone else identified something that they would be upset they hadn’t done. These included not having seen more of the world, not having put their affairs in order, leaving too much stuff for their children to sort through, not having mended relations with children and in other cases parents, not having helped friends in need.
We then talked about what kind of questions people want to dig into deeper in future meetings. The questions ranged from extremely practical to highly philosophical. Here are some examples: “how can I be ambitious without being aggressive?” “how can I live a good life in a society that’s increasingly corrupt?” “what is our brain good for in the age of AI?” “how can we start a gift culture in our community?”
I am excited to continue with this group. We will pick a specific question for each new session and prepare with some readings proposed by members. Truly in the spirit of “learn together.”
Illustration by Clara Kirkpatrick.