I don’t believe there is a greater meaning to life. Sorry. There doesn’t seem to be an end game. We just love to ascribe something greater to help us grind through the struggle that being human entails. So if there isn’t some grand goal, some finish line where we collect our trophies, what’s the point?
It’s now. The present. The moment. God exists in our relationships.
I spent the weekend with my friend Ben isolated in the mountains of Appalachia where he’s made his home the last 9 months. The last time we saw each other he was dropping me in a cab in Costa Rica as the first wave of Covid started to mobilize and the world began to shut down. A week later his family would pack their bags and fly to their new property on a mountainside in North Carolina.
In the time between we’ve messaged almost daily, usually him and I and our friend Dean. Talking about our interests in fitness and nutrition and behavior. Watching the news hoping for a chance to get back to the jungle or the Midwest or anywhere we could meet and hang with our friends who also are really into this stuff that makes most people’s eyes glaze over in boredom.
In Charleston, I’m only 5 hours and a Covid test away from a visit. So after a few weeks here I jumped in a rental Corolla and hit the road.
To give you an idea of how secluded the mountain is, when I went to text Ben that I was there I couldn’t. I had no signal and had to backtrack ten minutes just to get one. Always an adventure. (Ben asked why I didn’t just walk up to the tiny house on the front of the property and knock. I have a lot of family in Appalachia, it’s not a place I wanna go wandering on strangers’ property unannounced.)
After some acclimation and getting my stuff settled we went up to the kitchen to say hi. Stephanie and Mister Kim I knew from CR but I made new friends in Cait and Joe and Erin and made Taos cry. Actually, Taos was suspicious of me all weekend. I don’t blame her. I’m sketchy af. But the feeling of being in a safe place with so many people was different than anything I’ve felt in months. As someone who didn’t feel particularly hampered by the isolation of Covid, as someone who’s introversion seemed perfectly suited to a life of quarantine and internet friendships, I was taken aback.
That night we had family dinner and it struck me what was so unique about this moment; this group of humans had spent the past months in relative isolation building a real life familial community. Literally. They built tiny houses and refurbished barns and growing produce and raising poultry. They built a community that will serve a business but in the process built a family. A modern day tribe. A life and lifestyle that seems lost in most of our lives.
Ben and I got to lift. We talked about our work and our industry a bit. But most of all, we laughed. We were present. We walked in the woods, watched cartoons and ate popcorn with the baby, sat in meditation. I got to meet and know really interesting people. And be almost obsessed about learning more about them and their particular talents and quirks. We forget how amazing people really are because we are so often wondering “what’s in it for us”. But in this moment, without the pretense of the “normal” world I was forced into a presence and awareness that rarely exists. I hope I don’t lose that when the world returns.
So what is the meaning of life? I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t care. Because if we can find meaning in the present, in the moment, that’s all the meaning we need. Life isn’t lived in the past of future. So if you’re stuck in either, are you really living?
