![]() Studying hard for a test and seeing the fruits of your labor pay off taking the time to feel the pride.Riding the perfect wave on your surfboard and allowing yourself to enjoy the triumphant moment.Listening to your favorite song and having the time to enjoy every note and every lyric.The end of a beautiful movie when things fall into place and we can’t help but feel good.There is a palpable difference in how meaningful moments feel from how other moments feel. What will be different when there is more coherence How do we identify what we value what matters most? How do we align the moments of our lives to these things? How do we resist the chaotic momentum that is building around us? How do we bring meaning? It is one thing to feel as though you should do something it is another to know how to do it. A second reason it is difficult to experience coherence and meaning in our lives is we haven’t developed the practices that help us know how to do it. We don’t take time to pause, be intentional and consider what matters most. One of the reasons it is difficult to experience the coherence and meaning in our lives is that life is moving so fast and we fear that we need to operate at the same pace to keep up. Why can it be a challenge to experience coherence and meaning? If we permit ourselves to feel busy all the time, even a life filled with coherent experiences loses meaning. The same can be true of important conversations at work, planning vacations, hosting guests, or volunteering. ![]() For example, helping our child with their homework may be completely aligned with our values, but because we have a long list, we treat the activity as something that has to get done, instead of experiencing it as a sacred act of parenting. In the second case, we are doing things that are important and aligned to our values, but we are so busy getting them done and checking them off a list, they lose the quality of feeling meaningful. They do not bring coherence to our lives. In all of these cases, there is nothing intentional about our actions. A family member is upset and suddenly we are trying to ‘fix’ whatever is wrong. We get an impulse that we need something and we drop what we are doing to respond. An e-mail pops up and captures our attention. In the first case, we are busy and doing all the time because we are reacting to things the world is placing in front of us. ![]() We are doing activities that are important but we are not taking the time to experience the meaning and value they are adding to our lives. If our lives feel busy, it typically means either that we are engaged with activities that are not aligned with what matters most to us. Our lives can either feel busy or they can feel meaningful. What is the connection between coherence and meaning? When our lives are coherent, all the parts make sense and are consistent with what we value and what we care about. ![]() What we give our precious time to reflects what is most meaningful and important to us. The work we do and the way we do it is aligned to what matters most to us and both bring out and reflect the best in us. The way we speak is consistent with how we want to be understood and experienced in the world. The way we spend and invest our money is consistent with our values. When our lives are coherent, things make sense. So what does it mean to have a coherent life? Coherence is unified, smooth, consistent, and has the quality of wholeness. In sports, it is easy to tell when the players are operating as a coherent team or when they are disjointed. A second definition states that the parts have the quality of forming a whole. They have the quality of being logical or consistent. In the literary sense, Coherence means that all the parts of writing or argument work together. The word Coherence is not a word we use every day unless, perhaps, we are an English Teacher, an athletic coach, or a physicist who works with sound/energy waves, but it is amazingly important to the quality of our lives. What does it mean to have a coherent life?
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