A Drop In The Bucket

I have love for someone that I have never had for anyone else - just a drop in the bucket. I have trust in my network of friends and advocates - another drop in the bucket. I have my favorite TV program, book and website - plop, plop, plop.

In truth, a human life is a bucket meant to be filled, with or without a list.

The importance of filling your bucket with heart-felt experiences of the good, the true, and the beautiful is more than having a full life; it's so that you can be part of the fulness of life. The fulness of life flows through the ages like a stream. Each life, whether half-full or half-empty, makes its contribution to the steady stream.

Faith allows people to go with the flow, whereas fear holds them back by the banks of the stream. Whether hiding out or simply resisting the free flow of ideas and beliefs in life's swift current, the buckets are being emptied continuously.

How else is mere dirt, or dust as it were, to reach eternal life? How else is a drop of earthly love or appreciation to become an ocean of love and celebration? How else understand that this life is neither source nor goal of human existence, but merely the conduit.

So, enjoy the journey via the Alpha and the Omega.

But if you feel stuck or weighed down by your life, here's a meditation that could help. Close your eyes and sit with your hands open to both receive and release. Now bring to mind all those people and things that are part of your survival here on earth. Drop them in the bucket. Next, think of all those people and places that you associate with a sense of belonging. Drop them in the bucket as well.

Continue bringing to mind all your friends and associates and drop them in the bucket. All your loves and those who make your life worth living also dropped in the bucket. Consider those that are easy to like and those that are not even bearable - drop them in the bucket. Finally, your inspiration and your crowning achievement in life to be deposited in the bucket.

At this point, you should be without every one and everything that means anything to you in this life. You are left with nothing and no one, as if your life has ended. Truly, you and every living being will one day kick the bucket. Yet, it's the bucket or, rather, the drop in the bucket that will be used, when full, to carry you home; just as surely as the stream ultimately joins the sea.