The Meaning In What We Do

Dr Viktor Frankl was incarcerated in the Nazi concentration camps during WW2. He painfully watched his family die – one by one – before him. However, he lived to relate his story and founded a new form of therapy called “logotherapy”. In his book “Man’s Search for Meaning”, he discusses the notion of reason, and reasoning.

According to logotherapy, we can discover this meaning in life in three different ways: 1) By creating a work or doing a deed; 2) By experiencing something or encountering someone; and 3) By the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering.”

People often ask WHY? I challenge WHY NOT? And, as a corollary to my gauntlet-in-your-face display: WHY NOT NOW? Our need “to know” can be infectious. Not knowing can be crippling. There is so much we may be juggling in our lives now that we lose focus at times. When was the last time you took stock over what you did? And, conduct an inventory check, personal skills audit, and document our milestones of achievements?

Apparently, Bryan Dyson, the former CEO of Coca-Cola feels that we juggle 5 different balls: a health ball, a family ball, a friend’s ball, a work ball and a spirituality ball. Four of the five are made out of crystal. If we drop them, they're going to shatter. Only one ball is made out of rubber and bounces back: the work ball. Now, is this the ball you wish to focus on? Do you want to lie on your deathbed lamenting: ‘I wished I spent more time at work!’?

Have we gotten it wrong? Have we gotten our balls confused? As a Juggling Coach, I teach my students to appreciate the many leadership lessons drawn from this powerful, tossing activity. The balls represent whatever matters to you (In the book, “Who Moved My Cheese?”, cheese is anything that you want it to be) in your life now. How do you manage to keep them all in the air? What happens if any of the balls fall?

A Juggler is prepared for the balls to fall. Dropping balls is part of the act. In Las Vegas, I have watched professional jugglers “goof” (intentionally) as it creates for better “drama”, and therefore meaning for the audience. Perhaps, in a perverse way, we enjoy watching somebody else fail or falter. Yet, we also root for their victory when the juggler succeeds - eventually. With elastic balls, bouncing delivers the ball back to the same height that it fell. Juggling teaches us a sense of timing and pacing. We determine the pathway of each ball, and we decide how fast or slow we want to go. The motivation (or pressure) comes from within.

Some authorities of human learning are of the opinion that the Western model of learning is too mechanistic; too simplified for Eastern philosophies. Perhaps, in wanting to find a more effective way of sharing and teaching we may resort to models that are simpler in nature. Models contribute to a paradigm but they should not, in themselves, be our paradigms of inertia and resistance.

To my Juggling Students – keep juggling and enjoy the journey. If the balls drop - they drop. Pick them up and keep going! Juggling is about MOVING THE BALLS – not catching them. Attempt it with durians the next time – see how far you are willing to go! Just make sure that your hands are protected (with wire-cutter gloves), or else you may not go past the your first toss (or the first “nose” for the few of you). Observe and adjust!