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OK, I admit it: the last post read like a snooze-fest. I wanted to highlight key Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) concepts that helped me get past unproductive thinking habits. Yet after FeedBurner sent the essay to my email inbox, I found it so boring I gave up on my normal re-check! No wonder the piece garnered no comments and prompted a small number of readers to unsubscribe.

To give us all a break, I’ll shift to other subjects for awhile after exploring one important distinction: the difference between values and goals.

According to ACT, a value is an aspect of life we want to nurture. Examples include: family, friends, work, spirituality, aesthetics, and play. Note the generality of these categories, and the diversity of manifestation. Family might mean tending children, parents, or pets. Work might be pursued by performing surgery or volunteering at a homeless shelter. Spirituality could suggest Roman Catholic mass or contemplation under a tree.

A value is the direction, while a goal is a destination. As an analogy, I might choose to head west from my home next to San Francisco Bay. Perhaps I’d drive an hour to reach the Pacific Ocean. Or I could sail a boat to Hawaii. Or maybe I’d fly to Tokyo. “Going West” could be achieved in any number of ways.

It is possible to pursue values ineffectively. One doesn’t make westward progress by driving from here to Mexico. While many of us want to help those in trouble, we sometimes end up doing harm rather than good. Mindfully listening to someone in pain offers support and compassion. But advice, while usually well-intentioned, is often poorly received.

We can always progress toward our values, no matter our limitations. To head west, all I need to do is walk a little westward. One can be an affectionate spouse (value) with a simple smile (goal).

Note that a value is never exhausted. I could travel west forever, round and round the globe. Supporting our friends (a value) is not something we finish, the way we might complete an errand for someone ill (a goal). There is always more work to be done and fun to be had. Of course, at some point we run out of energy and time. We die. So pursuit of values ends, but not in the sense of polishing off a task.

Nor is our quest toward value about leaving a permanent mark; all our works eventually will be forgotten. We build meaning into our lives for its own sake.

Look at the big picture: the sun will expand as it burns up its fuel. Eventually, “the Earth will plunge into the core of the red giant sun and be vaporized.” Science fiction notwithstanding, there is little chance that humanity will escape physically to other planets, except perhaps as well-shielded, frozen embryos. All the glorious work of civilization will be lost, at least in material terms.

To the cynical, this might seem futile, or even absurd. Why strive, day after day, if all comes to naught? It sounds like Sisyphus, ever pushing his boulder uphill only to watch it roll down again. But isn’t this the nature of life? Each spring new flowers bloom that are destined to wither and die. The promise of every birth ends in death sooner or later. The cycle of fertilization, germination, maturation, and deterioration never ceases. All that activity generates the lush, fecund beauty of our biosphere.

Albert Camus concludes his classic, The Myth of Sisyphus, with these words: “One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” His meaning is more bereft of optimism than mine (he is arguing for absurdity, which precludes hope), but the reasoning is similar: satisfaction demands we move something, despite inevitable collapse and decay.

Maybe our endeavors will be preserved as cosmic memory, embedded in a quantal microstructure (or the Mind of God, depending on your preferred terminology). But we don’t need to believe this to continue our lives. We romance, raise children, build bridges, and play music because Life asks this of us.

A necessary event in the Universe’s formation was what’s called symmetry breaking. I have only a vague notion of what that means, but it shows that we live in a fundamentally fractured world. The brokenness breeds vitality. We pick up the pieces not because there’s hope of repair, but because we love them.

Pursuit of values is not endless toil; it’s eternal dance.

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