How do you describe "living a full life" ?

[soos_mite_ah]

What does it mean to live a full life? 
How do you know you're living a full life? 
What milestones, if any, are a part of a full life? 

[Carl-Richard]

Integrating all aspects of yourself.

 

[soos_mite_ah]

@Carl-Richard Beautifully put 

[Brittany]

I honestly think that everyone lives a full life.

I feel like this idea of "I didn't live a full life" is a form of self attack.

And it's also blind to the beauty of God that is present in every moment. Not in the future. 

"I need to live a full life" thinks fulfillment comes in a future moment. Fulfillment is here , right now, in the presence of God.

You were swimming in the beauty of God since the day you were born - whether you realize it or not. You've been surrounded by grace even when you are in pain, even when you are acting selfish and negative, and even when you are wasting time on things that don't matter. Grace never left your side.

Your life has always been full, even if you can't see it.

[gettoefl]

9 hours ago, soos_mite_ah said:

@Carl-Richard Beautifully put 

be you to full

the one way to

be au ti ful

[vizual]

A life with meaning. I’d rather live on the streets but have meaning in my life than being filthy rich but nihilistic. It’s not even close. 

[Flowerfaeiry]

Having a wide range of unique experiences. 

[Gili Trawangan]

On 10/25/2021 at 9:52 AM, Brittany said:

I honestly think that everyone lives a full life.

I feel like this idea of "I didn't live a full life" is a form of self attack.

And it's also blind to the beauty of God that is present in every moment. Not in the future. 

"I need to live a full life" thinks fulfillment comes in a future moment. Fulfillment is here , right now, in the presence of God.

You were swimming in the beauty of God since the day you were born - whether you realize it or not. You've been surrounded by grace even when you are in pain, even when you are acting selfish and negative, and even when you are wasting time on things that don't matter. Grace never left your side.

Your life has always been full, even if you can't see it.

This.

[Ilan]

just be you

[FlyingLotus]

43 minutes ago, Gili Trawangan said:

On 10/24/2021 at 8:52 PM, Brittany said:

I honestly think that everyone lives a full life.

I feel like this idea of "I didn't live a full life" is a form of self attack.

And it's also blind to the beauty of God that is present in every moment. Not in the future. 

"I need to live a full life" thinks fulfillment comes in a future moment. Fulfillment is here , right now, in the presence of God.

You were swimming in the beauty of God since the day you were born - whether you realize it or not. You've been surrounded by grace even when you are in pain, even when you are acting selfish and negative, and even when you are wasting time on things that don't matter. Grace never left your side.

Your life has always been full, even if you can't see it.

This.

Whoa  

[LastThursday]

I'd say recognising our immense potential and then using that potential. Most of us are like Ferraris being used to just go to the grocery store, and then being parked back in the garage for another week. Put a different way living a full life is self-actualisation.

How do you know that we're living a full life? It's incremental. As we actualise more and more we lead fuller lives. Living a full life is about everything: good relationships, material wealth, experiences, spirituality, nature, life purpose, direction, joy, fun, work, everything. It's the entire human condition.

In terms of milestones we could do worse than follow the Stages of Ego Development model by Cook-Greuter and pin ourselves against that as we progress. But I'd say the very basics of actualisation should be learning:

• Good impulse control
• Good decision making
• Mood control
• The ability to introspect and step outside ourselves

 

Edited October 26, 2021 by LastThursday

[soos_mite_ah]

On 10/24/2021 at 9:52 PM, Brittany said:

I honestly think that everyone lives a full life.

I feel like this idea of "I didn't live a full life" is a form of self attack.

And it's also blind to the beauty of God that is present in every moment. Not in the future. 

"I need to live a full life" thinks fulfillment comes in a future moment. Fulfillment is here , right now, in the presence of God.

You were swimming in the beauty of God since the day you were born - whether you realize it or not. You've been surrounded by grace even when you are in pain, even when you are acting selfish and negative, and even when you are wasting time on things that don't matter. Grace never left your side.

Your life has always been full, even if you can't see it.

I just recalled that I came to similar conclusions a couple months ago as well: 

On 8/30/2021 at 3:22 PM, soos_mite_ah said:

And there is no right way to experience life. That’s something that I’ve been contemplating lately especially when the topic of priorities come up.  Sometimes we judge one another on the priorities we have and when they don’t align with our own, we judge them as “wasting their life away.” I feel like people who were considered more nerdy growing up is more prone to this type of thinking that the media perpetuates. There is this trope of peaking in high school or college where during those years in your life, you were really social, really talented, really hot, etc, and you focused more on those efforts than you did to your work and then you end up basically failing at life. Peaking in high school or college is often characterized as a popular kid thing but honestly, I don’t think the dorks are immune to this phenomenon. I have met some people who have this whole complex about being a nerd growing up where they’re like “when I was in high school, I paid attention in school and didn’t party and stayed away from drugs and now look at me killing it in life.” And to the people with that complex, all I have to say is “how is your social and emotional health going? Do you have a good way to balance your work and your life or is the success you got from work pretty much ruling your life and you cling onto it because it justifies your pain and trauma you got from lack of social connection growing up and now your career makes it seem like that suffering was ‘worth it’” (listen, I know this sounds really bitchy but like mood). I guess what I’m trying to say is that don’t get a superiority complex around your life decisions because you can still learn from the experiences of others. If they have different experiences, odds are that they probably have something to teach you as well.

And I feel like a lot of the stereotypical smart/good kids sometimes get shades of this because growing up they are told that they are prioritizing the right things and that life is going to fall into their lap if they continue like this and that you will grow up to be better than those other kids in the long run. It’s just a breeding ground for contempt. It’s ok to be envious about someone else’s lifestyles and priorities but I think it’s important to recognize that and see yourself in a different lane doing your own thing that is right for you. Your lane isn’t better or worse nor is your destination going to be better or worse. And you’re probably going to go through different phases of your life where your priorities shift around anyways. We’re all in a different season in our lives and while Chad over there is prioritizing his social life and is developing his social skills and figuring out dating at 16 and then goes into contemplative hermit mode 10 years later, that doesn’t make his path better or worse if compare it to how you went into contemplative hermit mode at 16 and then decided to focus on your social skills more later in life.

For the people who decided to take the self help route later in life, that’s ok. You didn’t waste your life. Sure there are pros and cons of doing this work earlier or later but one of the big pros is having a lot of life experience and being able to draw on those past experiences instead of theorizing a bunch of what ifs. And as a result, you may have more concrete examples of lessons in life as opposed to abstractions of what you should and shouldn’t do.   

And for the people who took this route earlier, there is no need to get a moral superiority complex around all of this. You aren’t ahead of anyone in life. You just decided to prioritize different things and that’s ok. I also feel like some young people who get super into self-development early and go hermit mode does feel envy towards normies because of the shit they've gone through on this journey but because that’s painful to admit, they transform it in moral superiority.