A Deliberately Lived Life

"Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them"

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quiet necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life"

These often-quoted lines from Henry David Thoreau inspire me and leave me sober in equal measure. Because they are familiar, I can pass over them quickly without feeling their force, their ability to open my eyes in order that I remember that to see is still, and always will be, an open question. These words can focus my scattered attention, bringing my thoughts to a point like lines of flight all travelling towards the horizon. Although this is only a momentary experience, and the horizon remains beyond my reach, I am not dismayed. I will continue to stretch myself out like light travelling outwards from a star that will die before the light has finished its journey.

Inspiration is a slippery notion. The same words can inspire one minute, and fail the next. Reading these lines repeatedly can deaden them, transform them into empty sounds. Printing them on a billboard can transform them into a means of selling something, selling a lifestyle perhaps. Treating them as universal wisdom, for all ages and all people, is like petrifying them and entombing them so that they fade into the background, where they will remain, invisible.

Despite all this, when I re-read these lines I can still hear them singing. Despite the temptation to be cynical, to think that today it is impossible to live deliberately, that sucking out the marrow of life has become an obligation ("Enjoy life! Actualise your potential!"), and that quiet desperation is all that awaits us, I still believe in the power of these words, I still believe in deliberate life, I still have hope.

I've read many things recently which have tested my hope. I've read about the rise of mass slums, increased social inequalities, new apartheids and forms of segregation, consolidation of wealth for the super-rich, rising unemployment, the continual erosion of real democracy and the public sphere, and so on. Perhaps the most dispiriting of all is seeing corporations and wealthy individuals appropriating inspiring ideas and words for their own, impoverished ends. When non-conformity, individuality and creativity are all embraced by multinational corporations in order to generate higher profits, it is tempting to resign oneself to what seems like our necessary and bleak fate.

And yet, something in me still flickers like the light of long-dead stars shining in the night sky. I read Thoreau's words and remember that he too faced great challenges, as every poet, writer and thinker has done. As everyone has done. I remember that it is possible to wake up, to stand up tall, and see things anew. Words such as those above can inspire us to think again, to pick up a pen and write, to talk with someone, to listen more carefully, and to be determined and creative. Even after words like these have been repeated, appropriated or buried, there remains a residue, stubbornly resisting all projects which engage them in some way. However determinedly one tries to marshal words, they always, inevitably, slip through every grasp. They are a kind of boundless life that sits at the horizon, always visible, but always slightly out of reach. Even if we close our eyes, or forget to see with our eyes, we can always learn to see again, to see anew, and to see what we've seen.

To return to my first remark: reading these lines of Thoreau leaves me both inspired and sober. The issue of how to live, of how I should live, or how I choose to live, seems to only grow as time goes by. It weighs on me more and more, as if my body were becoming denser and heavier each day. The question of how to live is like a faded image coming into relief, getting gradually clearer to the point at which I cannot ignore it. And yet, despite the heaviness of life, in a quiet moment of reflection, in reading inspiring words, or in seeing things from a new perspective, I can feel myself floating imperceptibly above the ground, like the horizon between the earth and the sky.

Reading Thoreau reminds me that even if I were to lose all my possessions, even if I were to lose my family and friends, my job, my home, my place in society, and so on, I'd still have my life to live. And even though I won't always have my life to live, until the moment when my life will end, I will still have to live it. Despite the challenges, the obstacles and the various forces of coercion and influence, it is still possible to resist, to transcend, and to surpass life as it has been, life as it is, and life as it should be.

For me, one of the few questions that I believe is worth asking continually throughout life is: can one look unflinchingly at life as it is and still affirm it? Reading Thoreau fills me with courage and hope that I can live deliberately with my eyes open.