2008-11-04
As I have expressed to my family, but perhaps not yet to my blog, I have been feeling very jazzed on life lately. Supremely jazzed.
Anyway, there is an essay that I read, actually a commencement address written by David Foster Wallace, that my friend Sheehan brought to my attention recently which I think pretty much sums up what I was/am attributing to my energy level. I will link to it and maybe add a teaser paragraph. It is a damn shame that David Foster Wallace was depressed and killed himself this year. Because he evidently knew a damn lot about living.
The essay is here snippet:
And the so-called real world will not discourage you from operating on your default settings, because the so-called real world of men and money and power hums merrily along in a pool of fear and anger and frustration and craving and worship of self. Our own present culture has harnessed these forces in ways that have yielded extraordinary wealth and comfort and personal freedom. The freedom all to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the center of all creation. This kind of freedom has much to recommend it. But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talk about much in the great outside world of wanting and achieving. The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.