Life is Now

I came across this article whilst looking for furniture, for reasons which will become obvious when you read it. I suppose essentially it is about impermanence and change, about the transient nature of life, but I'm not really sure what it's saying beyond that (if anything!). That is just one of the things which irritates me.

There is the naive supposition that for the writer's mother's generation, life and work was somehow settled, predictable and knowable, which is nonsense on so many levels. Quite apart from the fact that life has NEVER been any of those, it was during her mother's era that the idea of a job for life was completely turned on its head - it may have been an expectation for the previous generation, but not 30 years ago.

Then there is the slightly "woe is me" tone of the article, an apparent lack of understanding that to a great extent we create our own fortune, that adversity and disruption occur in everybody's life, but managing them and coping effectively is largely governed by how we perceive all of it. We don't have to feel that the world has it in for us, or believe we are just unlucky.

Finally, maybe she needs to make a decision about the coffee table and move on. I accept that the coffee table and the sofa are metaphors, but let's get matters in perspective - is it really worth agonising so long over them? I recognise that grieving for her mother is undoubtedly affecting her judgement, so my suggestion would be, either forget about the coffee table altogether for now, or make the choice and concentrate your efforts and attention where they need to be. And maybe the coffee table is a handy distraction, because her grief is so painful.

Nevertheless, I would have thought that one of the most important lessons from her mother's untimely and rather sudden death is that life is now, so don't waste too much time focussing on non-essentials.