About two months ago, I came across Simon Boas’ moving (and now viral) essay, “An Optimist’s Guide to Dying.” Perhaps, like me, you’ve also read Paul Kalanithi’s When Breath Becomes Air. Our modern world tends to be full of goals of personal growth and self-actualization, of extending lifespan and healthspan, of aspiration and ambition. No wonder that reflections on mortality, especially when they are so poignantly and powerfully crafted, capture our attention.
Both Boas’ essay and Kalanithi’s memoir are well worth reading for dozens of reasons. But for the sake of this post, I am struck by one thing they have in common: the authors’ vocational call and the experiences of their working careers are central to their reflections about the meaning of their lives. Whether it is Boas sharing about crossing borders with diplomatic immunity and distributing millions of dollars in international aid, or Kalanithi describing the grueling ordeal of a neurosurgery residency and patients saved and lost, our experiences of work, of vocation, of calling, are at the core of what makes life worth living.
My own vocational journey has been full of twists and turns that I could never have expected. When I graduated from Stanford with undergraduate and graduate electrical engineering degrees at the very beginning of the dot-com boom, I did not expect to be a pastoral intern less than ten years later. I didn’t hit it big with a startup, I’ve made peace with the fact that I’ve vastly under-earned the cachet of my degrees. I was vocationally drawn into pastoring to be with people – no, even more than that, to be an expression of God’s care and love for people – in the most significant moments of their lives. I’ve prayed in hospital rooms after a loved one just breathed their last breath. I’ve walked with people I love through weddings and divorces. One sermon I preached so touched a listener that she shared that she listened to it every day for a year, because it was what she needed to hear from God each day. All the highlights and lowlights from two decades of pastoring are now a part of who I am and my sense of place and purpose in the world.
What about you? As you reflect on your own vocational journey, whether you find yourself in a season of triumph or struggle, I encourage you to pause and embrace gratitude for the experiences that have shaped you. And to the extent you have a choice, continue to bend the arc of your vocational call towards the things that are most important to you, most reflective of your desire to seek good for others in this world. Transition seasons, even ones we would not have chosen for ourselves, are opportunities in this regard.
Ultimately, it is impossible to read Boas or Kalanithi without the sense that life and work have authentic meaning. We aren’t just building sand castles by the ocean, to be swept away by the tide. The work of our hands matters. Our work is one way that we express love into this world, one way that we make a difference in the lives of others. The best response to this incredible privilege of vocation is gratitude.
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