The bridge most lacking on Earth is an authentic bridge of empathy. There are very few among us who seem to genuinely grasp the potential contents of another's mind, heart and spirit. Even they achieve only a brief glimpse of such depths of connection before it fades. Human memory being incredibly fragile and fleeting robs us ultimately of our true experiences to leave us only with what we believe we experienced rather than the exact sensations, thoughts and feelings of the time. So much quality of our own life is lost rather rapidly both because we give so little real effort in deliberate living and because even our best conscious attempts are lost naturally with time. I would wish for more premeditated living in us all and for a less fragile memory but, more than all else, I wish for an enormous leap in the human ability to genuinely empathize, not simply informed imagination regarding the content of another's mind, heart and fullest spirit, but rather first-hand experience of that content. If my own mind and heart and spirit could experience precisely that of another - a direct experience - that would be a bridge priceless in its value. Such direct connection would give us all pause in our own character. We would no doubt rethink what we think, say and do ... and don't. We would know the joy of another or the immense lack of joy, their pains or inabilities to pain. We would know someone, anyone, everyone truly and, beyond the usual pat statements, perhaps better than they know themselves. All experiences would be our experiences, and ours the experiences of all.

This is the bridge we so dearly lack, and the bridge I wish for most and always.

It seems I'm always whistling, humming or singing Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes". My wife and I used to karaoke pretty frequently a few years back and that was always a favorite of the crowd wherever we were. I liked singing it for my wife, Julia, especially because it still says so much of how I feel about a good many things. To me, it's the love song I should have written. At least I have the privilege of singing it fairly well and not killing it when I do.

What makes something worthwhile is the fact of life itself. It is only a living thing that can value or not value and it is only life that has need of values, of worth, of meaning. It will bother the thinking of some or many but, it is true, without its relationship to a life, to many lives or all life in general, a thing has no inherent worth. Value, worth, meaning are only possible to that which must choose between options to either benefit or not benefit its life. Because of this, the degree to which one values one's own life, the depth and quality of one's passions, determines the depths to which one can feel a thing worthy or unworthy or value-neutral. We each feel love or hate ... or experience indifference ... toward our own lives in very personal ways perhaps sometimes similar to the ways of others but, in the end and wholly, we value differently than anyone else. We human beings are at times inconsistent and sometimes very consistent in the quality of our love for ourselves, the frequency of that love and our reasons for it. We continually estimate worth and change our minds or confirm our previously thinking or feelings on the matter. This is to say the worth of a thing isn't necessarily a constant or a guarantee from moment to moment or from person to person, life to life.

What makes a thing worthwhile? The fact of life first. From that point on, it always depends on one's current love or hate or apathy toward that life and, by association, toward other life as well. If you find a thing worthwhile, it is because you have life and that thing in some way fits with what continually evolving worth you place on your life. Because we are each in a continual state of change, the worth of a thing changes with us. To discover the worth of something in the moment's context, ask yourself, what do I value most? The worth of the thing can always be judged by its relationship to your individual and very personal and ever-changing answer to that question ... and always will.

Of course, prepare yourself to sometimes be ... completely wrong.