Book 204 - A Year of Magical Learning

Reflection Title: Purpose Never Expires!

Book – Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach

Book Description:

Stiff is an oddly compelling, often hilarious exploration of the strange lives of our bodies postmortem. For two thousand years, cadavers―some willingly, some unwittingly―have been involved in science's boldest strides and weirdest undertakings. In this fascinating account, Mary Roach visits the good deeds of cadavers over the centuries and tells the engrossing story of our bodies when we are no longer with them.

Reflection:

I think Mary Roach and Bill Bryson might truly be long lost siblings or something.

The consumption of a Mary Roach and / or Bill Bryson book is truly a unique experience. There is learning upon learning jam packed from start to finish about seemingly mundane topics that they can somehow morph into an epic journey. Pound for pound, you will never learn more new information about an assortment of varied topics than if you read a Mary Roach or Bill Bryson book. They will take you on a learning odyssey that spans science, history, geography, or natural history that is fun and always entertaining.

Consuming one of their books for me almost feels meditative in a way that I can’t describe in words. I feel like I’m in a trance the whole time absorbing just an insane amount of new information while I listen to them weave their narrative, but I don’t hate it. It feels soothing and incredibly relaxing. It is very challenging to describe.

That said, while consuming a Mary Roach / Bill Bryson style book jam packed with info, the ironic thing is that I always have a really hard time picking out a lesson that I can take to apply to my life after I finish. It feels weird to learn so much from them and then be left going, well what did I really just learn that I can actually apply to my life? It is a real struggle and a mystery that I can’t quite figure out. Is it too much learning overindulgence, like eating too many deserts at Thanksgiving where they all blend together other than the sugar rush at the end? Maybe that is it, these books are my learning overindulgence guilty pleasure. I can’t do it all the time, but a few times a year it is okay to splurge. I know that I’m signing up for a brain scramble at the end, but maybe that is the fun of it all.

If I had to pick a lesson that I could apply to my life specifically from Stiff, it might be the idea that our purpose doesn’t expire when we leave this Earth. These cadavers play an incredibly important role in helping the living to understand our minds and bodies so we can continue to grow and evolve as a species. These cadavers may or may not have led a purpose driven life while they were physically alive, but they all found a new purpose in the afterlife in serving greater humanity through letting us research and study them.

This is the circle of life. There is purpose in living, just as there is purpose in death. Purpose never expires, it just changes as we change.

This makes me think of Emilia, because everything makes me think of her :slightly_smiling_face:. She was only physically with us in this world for a short 39 days. While to some, this might seem tragic and short, and it was. To others, they might see something a little different if they looked a little more closely. They might see that Emilia helped her doctors to take one tiny step forward toward understanding the disease of NEC and helping other babies like her someday. They might see that Emilia changed my life, helped me to find my purpose, and is the cause of inspiration that keeps me going today. They might see that what art flows out of me, through what I learned from her, will have an impact on so many other lives that neither of us will ever know. They might see that the words and stories that I’m taking the time to write today, will live on for the rest of time.

If you look hard enough, what you might see is that Emilia is still “alive”! That is what I see when I think of Emilia. She is still here with us, maybe not physically, but her purpose lives on and reverberates through the myself and every other life that she knowingly or unknowingly touched or will touch in the future. The same will be for me, and every other human being as well.

We are all in this together, and whether you are alive, a cadaver, a spirit, or just a memory…we all have a purpose and something to give back to this world.

Question: How does the memory of loved ones that are no longer with us influence you each day?

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Links:

What is The Year of Magical Learning? An Introduction

YOML Podcast Discussion - Coming Soon

YOML Bookstore - Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach