random musings

being a marketing major, i’ve studied ad campaigns by some of the big guys. how products undergo name changes when going international (chevy renamed the nova when exporting to mexico because its name when translated literally means “it doesn’t go”; coca-cola when selling in japan had to change their name from “bite the wax tadpole”. i think there was even one company who mistakenly labeled their company “I am a jelly donut!”). i also learned the cultural studies that play into the big slogans. one of my earliest marketing memories is from maxwell house–”Good to the last drop.”

i have a friend whose life slogan would probably be live love::love life, and she seems to actually live it out. the phrase is constantly on her lips. ’tis a lovely phrase at the sound of it, but i think somewhere in the details of life we often lose touch with the ideals we would like to live by. whether i’m too busy, or i’m afraid of making myself vulnerable, or trying to preclude the transforming of my soul into a welcome mat, i find myself falling short. i came across this passage (another plug for brennan manning!) today and, i guess where i am in my walk, it struck me as applicable. either to myself, or to those i care for, or the church in general…

the unaffected heart is one of the dark mysteries of human existence. it beats dispassionately in human beings with lazy minds, listless attitudes, unused talents, and buried hopes. like ian bedloe’s mother, they never seem to get beneath the surface of their lives. they die before they ever learn to live. years wasted in vain regrets, energies dissipated in haphazard relationships and projects, emotions blunted, passive before whatever experiences the day brings, they are like snoring sleepers who resent having their peace disturbed. their existential mistrust of God, the world, and even themselves underlies their inability to make a passionate commitment to anyone or anything.

paradoxically, we attain self-awareness, not by self-analysis, but by the leap of commitment. according to viktor frankl, a person finds identity only to the extent that “he commits himself to something beyond himself, to a cause greater than himself.” the meaning of our lives emerges in the surrender of ourselves to an adventure of becoming who we are not yet.

the unaffected heart leaves a legacy of disney world paraphernalia and a thousand lost golf balls. the sheer vacuity of the unlived life guarantees the person will never be missed. “these people, living on borrowed emotions, stumbling through the corridors of time like shipboard drunks. . . never taste life deeply enough to be either saints or sinners.”

am i living life? or am i living vicarioiusly through the lives of others? Christ promises life to the full. abundant life. abundant highs. abundant lows. may i laugh loudly. may i weep with those who weep. may i love deeply. may i die broke, spent and tired. i don’t want to die with any life yet to be lived. may i live life to the last drop.