Alexandersmap

    Tag: Athens

    • A Sequence of Everything Wanted

      “Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.” ― A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

      Slow down you’re doing fine
      You can’t be everything you want to be before your time
      — Billy Joel, Vienna

      In a dizzying turn of events, last night capped a sequence of things wanted for some time delightfully happening one after the other, from Rome to Athens to Sicily to Florence to… New Hampshire. Life is sometimes simply great timing, realized. To visit the Colosseum and the Sistine Chapel and the Acropolis and Mount Etna, to see Michelangelo’s La Pietà and David to bookend an epic trip and then return home to find the elusive Aurora Borealis dancing in my own backyard hours later is a sequence I’ll be processing for some time, thank you. This isn’t meant to be a brag about how lucky the last couple of weeks have been, rather a realization that patiently working towards something combined with a bit of good luck goes a long way in a lifetime. Amor fati.

      The thing is, I wear my impatience on my sleeve (and blog about it more often than I ought to). Some of us simply want to get right to everything as quickly as possible, knowing that time flies and we aren’t getting any younger. Sure, tempus fugit, but slow down—you’re doing fine… Vienna waits for you. Simply plot the steps, do the work, follow through and hope fortune smiles on you.

      Hope is a tricky word, and that’s where impatience comes in. Perhaps the better word is trust. We must trust the process when we build our systems. Work, marriage, fitness level, artistic contribution, social interactions, and yes, bucket list items are all lifestyle choices built on faith that doing this will lead to that. When it doesn’t arrive promptly we restless types get a bit impatient, so a reminder of all that’s come to pass helps now and then. Gratitude goes a long way.

      Life lessons are all around us, if we simply stop rushing about so much and focus on the journey. The biggest lesson is that the journey continues, and each milestone is simply a marker for where we’ve been and what we’ve seen and who we were at the time. What’s next matters too, doesn’t it? Our past is our foundation for the growth to come. We shall get there some day. For haven’t we thus far?

      Aurora Borealis, New Hampshire 10 May 2024
      Aurora Borealis, New Hampshire 10 May 2024
      Aurora Borealis, New Hampshire 10 May 2024
      Michelangelo’s La Madonna della Pietà
      Michelangelo’s David

    • A Day in Athens

      “A Greek is alive to the fingertips; he oozes vitality, he’s effervescent, he’s ubiquitous in spirit. The Englishman is lymphatic, made for the armchair, the fireside, the dingy taverns, the didactic treadmill.” — Henry Miller, The Colossus of Maroussi

      Athens is named after Athena, the ancient goddess of wisdom, and the Parthenon is dedicated to Athena, so one surely must make a pilgrimage to the Acropolis and the Parthenon when one is in Athens. And so it was that I joined thousands of people climbing the stairs to visit these ancient sites. But a day in Athens ought to include more than a visit to a few touristy places.

      A bit of traffic, a healthy portion of delicious Greek food and wine, a few Olympic sites, and mostly, some time with the lovely Greeks is essential for one to know the place. Athens, and Greece as a whole, is an easy place to fall in love with. So too the people. Highly energetic and passionate, Greeks exude the spirit of carpe diem. One must follow their example and seize the day oneself.

      The history buff in me appreciates the historic sites. The stoic in me appreciates the sense of place. The artist, the beauty. It’s surely overcrowded and a bit crazy, but timelessly lovely just the same. To ooze vitality, to be fully alive, this is the Greek way. To experience it was extraordinary, to return is essential.

    • The Given

      “I inherit from the past of my family, my city, my tribe, my nation, a variety of debts, inheritance, rightful expectations, and obligations. These constitute the given of my life, my moral starting point.” — Athenian oath

      If the way we live our lives is based on the routines and beliefs we establish for ourselves over time, the foundation for those routines and beliefs is that which we’ve been given by the circle of people who have surrounded us from our beginning. The desire to break free from that circle begins in our teenage years, but there’s no getting around the momentum of the given. Our very identity is formed by those we’ve been surrounded by. Is it any wonder that some people move away, that they may be someone else?

      When we think about the people who have influenced us most, we begin to understand ourselves more. Our positive and negative voice that quietly whisper to us as a running dialogue, waiting to rise to the surface to make an appearance in our best and worst moments? Given. Our fallback position on everything from religion to politics to underlying feelings about people who are “different from us”? Given. Our lives begin with momentum. But that which is given is merely our foundation. We are the architect for who we become beyond our base.

      “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” ― Jim Rohn

      That circle changes over our lifetime. The gravitational pull of our belief system from when we were a child changes as the circle influencing us changes. When we go off to college or move to a faraway place, we are breaking free of that which once influenced us and placing ourselves in a new, developing circle. Most of us have the personal freedom to choose who we want to be. It begins with who we surround ourselves with, and how we spend our days. Habits and routines are as essential to our becoming as who we started out as in the beginning.

      Lately I’ve been in many conversations about what we’ve been given. Our emotional, intellectual, physical and financial foundation established momentum for each of us. It’s up to us to keep that momentum going from there, but there’s no doubting the impact of the forces that brought us here. It’s easier to become what’s next with a running start than it is from a static position. Reflecting on our own momentum might enhance our empathy for those who start without any. When we think about it, we are all part of the same tribe, aren’t we?

      “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill

      We are all part of someone else’s circle. Isn’t it just as fair to ask ourselves what are we giving, perhaps even more than what are we getting? That Athenian oath doesn’t just speak of rightful expectations, but of obligations too. Living a meaningful life demands that we use that positive momentum to pull others up as well, that our circle grows larger. Great societies and cultures are built on such things as this. This is true excellence, for it lives beyond us.