8 tweets · January 2021 · 42 likes · 2 retweets · read on Twitter
“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” — Howard Thurman I think about this quote sometimes. 🙃ethical framework: 1. perceive the whole world as best you can 2. love as thou wilt
If you can simultaneously be experiencing profound ecstatic joy & pleasure to be doing what you're doing, and also be compassionately aware that others are experiencing profound nihilism, despair, & hell... ...and act from there... ...something becomes possible.
It's hard to put words to the thing. @HFreinacht has a great bit in The Listening Society where at least names the dimensions (up, down, & range) I'm describing in the previous tweet, and notes them as important and oft-overlooked dimensions of maturity...
He notes there's also: • symbol stage (how developed is the culture you are thinking in) • cognitive complexity (how sophisticated are the structures of thoughts you're able to think) These are clearly also key components to what it means to act well in the world.
But then also this!
Which relates also to Howard Thurman's point—all of the world's woes that are caused by things like bureaucracies and so on would be impossible in a world full of people who have come alive.
This thread feels sloppy but whatever, it's a sketch of a thing. I want to sign off twitter for 24h (after digesting whatever other notifications first)
I wrote a bit more about this later, starting with this tweet: