The Bucket List

It is interesting, isn’t it, that a person comes to this earth as a tiny helpless human being; just one minuscule somebody joining the billions of people who live here now and who have lived here before…and yet she is aware from very early on that she is a one-of-a-kind, unique individual who is a separate, stand-alone “Me” And then she spends the rest of her life trying to figure out just who that “Me” really is.  

We each seem to carry an exclusive agenda and we discover as time goes by that we have miraculously been given talents or abilities to engage that very distinctive agenda.

Truman G. Madsen in his book Eternal Man refers to this quote that rings true to me:

What did the Master recommend? – These strange sentences about “becoming as a little child”? …Maybe he was saying that a child has swift, untinctured affinity and response to his own burning deeps. He is exemplary not, as if so often said, in vulnerable readiness to believe others’ voices, but in soul-unity that prevents disbelief of his own. He has a whole, happy, healthy relationship with the core of creativity and spirituality which is his glory-laden spirit.

I sat in a restaurant the other day and observed the individuals at the tables around me. I could see a table of fire fighters intent on their meal, and at another table sat several young mothers with more children than I could count, due to the fact that some were under the table and some were getting straws and some were asleep in strollers.  In the corner an elderly man read a book next to a table of teenagers each texting on their individual iPhones. It occurred to me more than ever before as I studied the scene and then the individuals in it, that we all really do have a unique purpose, our own reason for living; even if we naturally gravitate toward groups of individuals with similar agendas.

These thoughts came as an aftermath of me thinking that perhaps; just perhaps it’s time to create a bucket list.  I pulled a journal from the bookcase with lots of blank pages that I had purchased a few years ago. Flipping through it I saw that it remained a book of blank pages so I opened it to the first page, picked up a pencil and wrote “Bucket List”.  Ok, decision number one…perhaps I shouldn’t write in pencil! Too easily erased.  So I put down the pencil and reached for a pen; still not the commitment I wish to make….I reached instead for the black Sharpie and wrote darkly over the penciled letters…

BUCKET LIST

It is a different list than I would have made as a child, or as a teenager, a young woman or even as a mother. Things are different now from this vantage point. My goal now is to accomplish everything that would make me look back at life and say…I understand now who I am.  

I’m amazed because I’m not feeling the need to scrawl onto the list statements like…”Explore an unknown land” or “become this” or “succeed at that” but it’s more like an awareness of what Rusty Rustenbach pondered, “Day-by-day as we listen, He’s calling into being facets of our design, character, and destiny that were previously absent or missing. He’s calling you into being all and everything He had in mind before you were even born.”  And with that in mind it seems that I can easily list those things that still feel lacking, things that I can actually do. I'm intrigued by the fact that it's less about me and more about what I still have left to do for others.

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I create a thoughtful list and then I count. There are 16. Doesn’t seem like much and yet I’m overwhelmed with the task at hand. I do perceive however, that there is a central important purpose.

In a talk many years ago Thomas S. Monson said:

Robert Woodruff, an executive in a former generation, traversed America with a message which he delivered to civic and business groups. The outline was simple, the message brief:

• The five most important words are these: I am proud of you.
• The four most important words are these: What is your opinion?
• The three most important words are these: If you please.
• The two most important words are these: Thank you.

 To Mr. Woodruff’s list I would add, “The single most important word is love.”

When I realize that the activating key to each of these 16 things is love, I see it also as a unifying thread connecting them and I must use my talents, (that still need development) to give of that love and accomplish each goal. 

I think of the story of the orphan who would throw notes over the orphanage wall with the handwritten words “Whoever finds this…I love you.”  I'm reminded again that the need to give love is as powerful as the need to be loved.  And that only by tackling my bucket list using my talents and abilities with love being the base purpose will I become more like the person God designed me to be and more closely fulfill my earthly agenda.

But…even so, it’s an overwhelming list and truth be told a little disappointing in its lack of grandness.  But then I'm reminded of that Mother Teresa saying…what was it? I look it up:

And then this old story (a favorite that bears repeating) about the starfish, attributed to Loren Eisley:

I awoke early, as I often did, just before sunrise to walk by the ocean's edge and greet the new day. As I moved through the misty dawn, I focused on a faint, far away motion. I saw a youth, bending and reaching and flailing arms, dancing on the beach, no doubt in celebration of the perfect day soon to begin.

As I approached, I sadly realized that the youth was not dancing to the bay, but rather bending to sift through the debris left by the night's tide, stopping now and then to pick up a starfish and then standing, to heave it back into the sea. I asked the youth the purpose of the effort. "The tide has washed the starfish onto the beach and they cannot return to the sea by themselves," the youth replied. "When the sun rises, they will die, unless I throw them back to the sea."

As the youth explained, I surveyed the vast expanse of beach, stretching in both directions beyond my sight. Starfish littered the shore in numbers beyond calculation. The hopelessness of the youth's plan became clear to me and I countered, "But there are more starfish on this beach than you can ever save before the sun is up. Surely you cannot expect to make a difference."

The youth paused briefly to consider my words, bent to pick up a starfish and threw it as far as possible. Turning to me he simply said, "I made a difference to that one." 

This final bucket list, this last stage of my earth’s agenda will not be a grand adventure or determine just how much fun I can have but I feel a sense of freedom in hoping to find joy in accomplishing some things that only I can do using my own unique talents in the hope of discovering more about me, sharing my love and making a difference even if it's just to one. And I'm comfortable with that agenda.

“Faith is the bucket of power lowered by the rope of prayer into the well of God’s abundance. What we bring up depends upon what we let down. We have every encouragement to use a big bucket.” 

- Virginia Whitman