for the record
“Live full lives. Leave some record.”
Wise words, well worth contemplating, these lines have been left to us by a meandering muse — a wild, wandering rogue of an Irish poet, amanuensis to Ezra Pound, teacher, traveler, and translator — who worked to live up to his words.
Whatever lines you wish to leave in your wake, living fully in this world, in all it’s broken beauty, truly calls for an authentic response.
Wherever you may find yourself, whatever you may bring with you — and whatever truth you may bring forth — there will certainly be many challenges to face, many questions to answer, and many gifts to acknowledge.
This is the full life — facing the challenges of your time, seeking your own answers, being faithful to your own experience and understanding — and responding to all that is, with all that you are, and all that you have been given.
In living fully, you will find many muses.
As the ancients advised, attend to the muses. Be ready, they say, to welcome the muse. And practice (with diligence and dedication) to honor the gifts they bring.
And then, in time — in whatever you see, and wherever you go — the muses will call forth from you feelings and thoughts, images and words which you had never fully encountered, engaged or expressed before — in your inner or outer world.
Their call will change the way you see everything — and how you relate to the larger story.
But it all depends on how you respond, when the muse comes calling.
A true response — that is, a response authentic to your own experience — can only come when you acknowledge what you have seen — for yourself.
Learning what that means to you, means giving voice to that experience, and leaving some record of it.
A record of some kind — in words, in your work, in your giving and your making. In what you shape and share, with your voice, your hands, your eyes, your body.
A who’s-its, what’s-it, true-to-life whatever, that comes right out of what you have seen and learned — where you dare to bare how deeply you have felt, where you reveal the fears you have faced, tell of the obstacles you have overcome, share the confounding and conflicting complexity of the different lives you have lived — witnessing and honoring all that you have learned.
The hard lessons, and the blissful highs. The books, the beauties, the battles. The peace, the passions, the panoramas, and the pains. The turning points, the high points, the hidden doors, and the dark corners. The openings, and the closings.
Who — and what, and when, and where — has been your muse? Where has that muse taken you? What has that muse shown you?
Living fully — in the real world — requires real risk, learning delivers hope, and hope springs from gratitude. All three call for openness and vulnerability.
Fully expressing the dangers, the delights, the mysteries and the magic, of living fully, certainly takes all three.
So go ahead — live dangerously.
Leave some record. Share what you have seen — for yourself — and what that means to you.
Only you can give the truest, fullest voice to that experience. Only you can convey with the sharpest detail and nuance what you have seen and heard. And only you can honestly name and honor the muses who have shaped your life, and how you have responded to them.
Use your words, and tell your story. And as always, be kind, but speak your piece.
What stories do you have to tell? What stories do you have to share? Set them free!
Don’t doubt, don’t delay.