more.

It’s interesting to wonder about the idea of what it means to be satisfied and the desire for more.

The newsflash here is that ‘we’ would not have life if we did not desire for more.

At Orange Theory Fitness (which just happens to be across the street from me AND has 5am classes…win…win) – they have a tag line: more life.

I was drawn to this language ‘more life’ right away because the concept has been the driver of my project: life…to live….to be alive (as the antidote to student death by suicide and school violence – in a ‘nutshell’). 

After the end of one OTF class, the coach said something about ‘more life’ meaning more years – to live longer.

Right away I thought, ‘oh no…nope…more life is now.’ 

Feeling satisfied and a desire for more. More life. Now.

Feeling satisfied feels good. Feeling satisfied really seems to hit a sweet spot of balance – not too much, not too little…enough. The word ‘satisfied’ is fairly agreeable as far as – it doesn’t really have that annoying intonation to it that feeling ‘happy’ or being ‘positive’ seems to have. The word and its meaning seems quite general, and at the same time captures a balanced state, a balanced feeling. 

There is something about the whole desire for more that is rooted in our humanness. We are wired to want more. 

Whoa. So how do we balance that?

For starters, I think this whole concept has to be taken into consideration by you and you alone.

Well, well, well…what do you know…just like that we are back to self-care and self-awareness. 

We can begin with a curiosity of what it even means to feel satisfied. Once you are familiar with or aware of this feeling, you now have a set point. A baseline. Not too much, not too little – enough. Satisfied. 

The feeling of satisfaction can be like ‘ghoul’. 

Let me explain. When I played games in my neighborhood growing up, we had a safety spot that we called ‘ghoul’ – I think ghoul is the best I can spell it phonetically. Most importantly, we all knew what it meant. We would begin at ‘ghoul’ and then play the game. We would leave ‘ghoul’ and then when we got scared or got chased we would return back to ghoul. You can’t get tagged in ghoul. You are safe. 

So this feeling of satisfaction is ghoul. Safe. Not too much. Not too little. Enough. A space to return to. A space to find comfort.

Life is calling for more. We want to live and take chances – to be curious. To leave ghoul and be brave. There is this elation and rush when we get further and further from ghoul – it’s exciting. We feel alive. We want more. The secret is that we know ghoul never goes anywhere. Ghoul exists. Ghoul has open arms. No rules. 

To have life. To be satisfied. To desire for more.

Ghoul. A space to return to. 

Ghoul is our well-being. A state or a mood.

When we desire for more without the awareness and stability of enough…of well-being…of the satisfying neutral…equilibrium. I think this is when we get messed up.

Love yourself enough to be curious about what it means to feel satisfied. Trust yourself enough to be okay with the desire for more. Be okay with enjoying the themes that bring life to you: thrilling, adventurous, funny, mysterious. 

Self-care (to me) means practicing tools, skills, and strategies that support you in the awareness and continuous return to the balanced state of well-being.  

Life is going to keep calling for more. More is not the enemy.

For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin – real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, or a debt to be paid. Then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life.

Alfred D Souza