Two excerpts, for the full article, see the notes


"It occurred to me that there were two sets of virtues, the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues. The résumé virtues are the skills you bring to the marketplace. The eulogy virtues are the ones that are talked about at your funeral — whether you were kind, brave, honest or faithful. Were you capable of deep love?

We all know that the eulogy virtues are more important than the résumé ones. But our culture and our educational systems spend more time teaching the skills and strategies you need for career success than the qualities you need to radiate that sort of inner light. Many of us are clearer on how to build an external career than on how to build inner character.

But if you live for external achievement, years pass and the deepest parts of you go unexplored and unstructured. You lack a moral vocabulary. It is easy to slip into a self-satisfied moral mediocrity. You grade yourself on a forgiving curve. You figure as long as you are not obviously hurting anybody and people seem to like you, you must be O.K. But you live with an unconscious boredom, separated from the deepest meaning of life and the highest moral joys. Gradually, a humiliating gap opens between your actual self and your desired self, between you and those incandescent souls you sometimes meet."

"External ambitions are never satisfied because there’s always something more to achieve. But the stumblers occasionally experience moments of joy. There’s joy in freely chosen obedience to organizations, ideas and people. There’s joy in mutual stumbling. There’s an aesthetic joy we feel when we see morally good action, when we run across someone who is quiet and humble and good, when we see that however old we are, there’s lots to do ahead.

The stumbler doesn’t build her life by being better than others, but by being better than she used to be. Unexpectedly, there are transcendent moments of deep tranquillity. For most of their lives their inner and outer ambitions are strong and in balance. But eventually, at moments of rare joy, career ambitions pause, the ego rests, the stumbler looks out at a picnic or dinner or a valley and is overwhelmed by a feeling of limitless gratitude, and an acceptance of the fact that life has treated her much better than she deserves.

Those are the people we want to be."

An introduction,
I would allow myself,
No more than that,
Instantaneously captivated by her,
Magnetized,
But I was fighting against gravity.

Knowing the depths of my baggage,
And the density,
Of the fog and noise around me.

I refused to be another stumbler,
Seeking your attention,
I would state my name,
And my awareness,
Of your existence in my universe,
And let the chips fall where they may...

But you made your existence blatantly apparent,
As if our spike in conversation,
Would prevent either of us denying,
A chemical reaction within our words,
Reading between the lines of you.

And now you linger...
Or not so much you,
But the idea of you,
Lingers on my palate.

Awaiting another taste,
Of what it might be like if our worlds,
Were ever again to collide.

They tell me I know what I'm doing.

I'm a master stumbler.

I record the sounds of my steps
along the cobblestones of thoughts
tracing me through mere minutes of my day.

I'm no predator of words,
hungrily snatching them from their sound slumber.
I've never slain a thought for
the sake of hanging its trophy on my page.

I have no brush at the ready,
no photographic,
impressionistic mind
gathering the sights and sounds
like a gambler collecting her winnings.

I could not, at gunpoint,
fire off the words to save my life,
no eloquent please,
no well turned phrases,
no sycophantic soliloquy.

I am the shell of my experiences,
my hide made only
of the ones that have hardened me.
     This is no way to love.

I'm a fumbler fumbling
A mumbler mumbling
A stumbler stumbling
Around women I like

I become catatonic
Somewhat neurotic
Completely dumbfounded
And I can't speak a word

The fear is too great
So I hesitate
The moments are lost
The longer I wait

I try to act cool
Despite all my drool
I end up a fool
As the hour grows late

I clam up and clamper
To avoid pure disaster
Lacking all candor
And I completely shut down

I'm stifled by fear
By all I hold dear
My words disappear
Just to be near you

My tongue goes numb
Too inept to overcome
The sheer terror inside me
As my heart beats like a drum

Progress a no go
From the chances I've blown
Withdrawn and alone
With painful undertones

Not a whisper or sound
No laughter just frowns
The challenge too great
Than should be allowed

Courage is fleeting
Despite the two of us meeting
I shy away
Just a scared human being

I foresee the outcome
You eventually leaving
Growing tired of my antics
I'm constantly repeating

So I stay within my comfort zone
Narrowly escaping
A connection with another
To keep my heart from breaking

Closed off from the world
That's cruel and unrelenting
One day I'll just disappear
And they'll be no more regretting

The what ifs and the woulda's
The could've and the shoulda's
The didn't and the don'ts
The wouldn't and the wont's

A coward in his shell
Living a living hell
Hidden between the shadows
In my own dungeon where I dwell

Too selfish to share my feelings
With another in my plight
I'm the guy with his eyes closed
Shielded from love at first sight