3/4/22 It’s a Wonderful Life Personally, I believe that a life well lived is not something that can really be exactly put into words, or at least I do not think there are necessarily any absolute answers. For instance, I do not think that someone needs to be remembered after they die in order for them to have led a good life, I am sure there have been millions of people that lived fulfilling lives in small villages all over the world that people do not remember but that does not mean their lives were not well lived. Nor do I think that a life well lived can be quantified with any particular actions or goals. To me personally, I think living a life well lived means that you will be able to look back on your life when you are old and be truly satisfied with the life you led, the choices you made, and how you got to where you are. It is important to consider these sorts of ideas, to think how you will view certain decisions from your deathbed. It is certainly a prevalent idea within the Catholic Church and many other religions with the idea of a memento mori. There people like Sister Theresa Alethia who would like to serve as a living memento mori to remind people to consider their own death and what sort of life they will leave behind (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/memento-mori-nun.html by Ruth Graham, Moreau FYE Week Three). While there are not absolutes to what contributes to life well lived there are most certainly common themes that seem to be present in a lot of people to report happy lives. Introspection about one’s own life is most certainly necessary at times but too much introspection or improper introspection can ultimately have an inverse effect on how it impacts your life making individuals more stressed out and worried about life. Over analyzing every single event and action of your life through meditation will never be helpful. Additionally if you are already in a negative mindset, analyzing your actions can sometime led people to simply go deeper into a spiral of anxiety and sadness because no matter what they perceive their action to be bad (https://ideas.ted.com/the-right-way-to-be-introspective-yes- theres-a-wrong-way/ by Tasha Eurich, Moreau FYE Week Six). As always there is a happy medium in between these two that can be beneficial; being able to impartially analyze our actions and reflect on them is crucial for becoming a better person, and it is absolutely necessary if we hope to live a good life. We need to be able to reflect on our lives to understand if the decisions we are making are the ones that will leave us happy down the road and this sort of introspection and mindfulness is absolutely crucial to being able to understand and discern what we want from life. Naturally, a large portion of what contributes to whether or not a life is well lived is what work we choose to do during our lifetime. No matter what we spend a significant portion of our lives doing work, what that work is can vary but it is important to seek out work that is worth doing for each individual. What work someone find as fulfilling will vary from person to person but it is important to understand what you want from a job. It can be hard find what work will be best for you but the most important things you can do are to know yourself, study what you enjoy, and try out a variety of jobs and majors; all of these things are important to understanding and discerning what you might want to do in life (https://undergradcareers.nd.edu/navigating-your-career-journey---moreau/ by Notre Dame, Moreau Week 4 FYE). While finding work that you enjoy doing would be ideal, it is not the only thing that might matter to someone when looking for jobs. At times a person may need to take a job that pays better but they do not life in order to support people they care about, though in a way that could still be considered work worth doing by the individual because it allows them to take care of those they love. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/memento-mori-nun.html https://ideas.ted.com/the-right-way-to-be-introspective-yes-theres-a-wrong-way/ https://ideas.ted.com/the-right-way-to-be-introspective-yes-theres-a-wrong-way/ https://undergradcareers.nd.edu/navigating-your-career-journey---moreau/ That simply goes to show that while jobs and work are important to consider when forming a life well- lived it is not the only things that is important. Ultimately, the relationships that we form tend to be the largest thing that contributes to leading a life well lived. These relationships are present in all other aspects of living a life well lived, and both forming good relationships and removing bad relationships are crucial to living a good life. That is not to say to only surround yourself with relationships that are always positive, that is impractical, all meaningful relationships will likely require some degree of work in order to maintain them. Additionally, having some adverse relationships is not inherently a bad thing because they can act as a contrasting point for what a good relationship should look like and they can help you learn how to overcome certain obstacles in your life. Pope Francis himself has stated that it is vitally important to form meaningful relationships with those around us, and that, to an extent, includes those around us who may not like us and those who we may not life. Holding hatred in your heart rarely increases your life expectance, and ultimately holding hatred for people in your heart only lets those people continue to have a degree of control over you (https://www.ted.com/talks/his_holiness_pope_francis_why_the_only_future_worth_building_includes _everyone/transcript by Pope Francis, Moreau FYE Week Seven). The relationships that we form truly dictate a great deal of how we will live our lives. Having positive relationships, even if they are purely professional or tangential relationships, contributes greatly to the sense of having a fulfilling life. You do not have to be best friends with everyone you meet, but you should not try to be antagonistic either. Ultimately, what living a life well lived mean it entirely up to each individual to decide. Obviously, we cannot all have quite as storied lives as Fr. Hesburgh and all of his endeavors, but that does not mean that we cannot find meaningful and fulfilling lives ourselves (https://canvas.nd.edu/courses/41005/modules/items/144076, by Jerry Barca and Christine O'Malley, Moreau FYE Week Two). In order to lead good lives we must be able to honestly and openly look within ourselves to ask ourselves questions about whether or not we truly enjoy the work that we do, the people we are around, or any number of other aspect of our lives if we ever hope to led a good life. https://www.ted.com/talks/his_holiness_pope_francis_why_the_only_future_worth_building_includes_everyone/transcript https://www.ted.com/talks/his_holiness_pope_francis_why_the_only_future_worth_building_includes_everyone/transcript https://canvas.nd.edu/courses/41005/modules/items/144076