life-affirming. I know he was a Buddhist, but I also know that there are many Buddhists whose choices and values put them much closer to the Kingdom of Heaven than many hateful sunday-church-goers. To the degree that you choose Life, you move yourself toward God, the author of Life, whose name is "I who Am".
Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.
See, we all live faith-based lives. The question is, what is your faith in?
Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
It is the nature of life that we live moment to moment, not knowing what will happen next, making choices based on what we believe is right - at least when we are not too tired or afraid or angry: those are the kinds of reasons that keep us from following our hearts. It seems that Mr. Jobs trusted in his heart, and he was singularly successful in following it.
Understanding that death is coming to us all is a great motivator. But there is an even better way, something better to trust in, and that is God himself, who is willing to send the Spirit of Christ to live within your all-too-deceitful heart and provide a better perspective. If you can bring yourself to be open to that possibility, Jesus will reveal himself to you, and following Him works better than following your heart. It felt like death to surrender my will to him, even seeing his love for me; and I'm always trying to take it back; but he said unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it cannot bear fruit. I find that whenever I can bring myself to betray my safe little self-portrait that I present to the world and be honest, a little of me dies and Christ lives in me a little more.
Living in the space-time continuum makes this a challenge, similar to following your heart, and for the same reasons: your moods, your energy level, your changing circumstances; when something happens that seems bad, like Jobs getting fired from Apple, and we hold fast, we often find looking back that maybe it wasn't such a bad thing.
I'm not saying every bad thing is like this. The sins of the world hurt many more than just the particular sinner. I've been wanting to make a sign that says "Cpl
So I see parallels with Steve Jobs' and my lives, and I see differences. I see parallels with anyone who is trying to choose life and love; but I believe that life and love are ultimately personified and embodied in Jesus. So we christians go through our lives trying to understand what He thinks is best, not seeing the future any more than anyone else, but trusting in something wiser and more constant than our hearts, more personal and powerful than destiny.
