The Religious society of Friends come together for Meeting for Worship.

There is an old Quaker story of the grandmother who took her grandchild to meeting one Sunday. After sitting a while the child reached up and whispered, "Grandma, when does the service begin?" And grandma replied "When the worship is over."

Friends we have been getting it backward. Service without adequate worship is worthless, and maybe even disruptive to the plan God has. Let us restore our Meetings for worship with worship and our service for after the rise of Meeting for Worship.

~ Mary Lou Peck

“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.” — Maya Angelou.

Some consider flourishing to be synonymous with thriving.  Flourish comes from the French word for flower - fleur.  Thrive is a Norse word which means "to take."  Flourish can also be a dramatic gesture (I always think of one of the three musketeers making an entrance)

As a person who loves words and the etymology of words, I think these differences are instructional. I'd even go so far as to say they are essential to understand the nature of human flourishing. When we consider a flower that is growing and beautiful and radiant it takes nothing, but is integral to its environment.  In my mind, I connotate thriving with taking and plunder. 

So what is it?  

• Is flourishing just what we can get our hands on or is it more? 
• Is it about money and power acquisition? 
• Can a person flourish in a vacuum?  For how long? 
• Can a person flourish for long without the community flourishing too? 
• What are the essential elements of flourishing? 

Positive psychology has quite a lot to say about flourishing.  Some of the key components are in the PERMA Model from developed by Martin Seligman, flourishing is built on five pillars: Positive Emotions, Engagement (flow), positive Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment.

If you've been around as long as I have you might recall "Debbie Downer" from SNL.  Someone says something and sure enough Debbie chimes in with some horrific story.  Essentially her life is defined by tragedy.  Many are depressed and miserable.  Many feel just getting to neutral (neither happy nor miserable) is a win.  Positive emotions is not being a Pollyanna, naively chipper no matter what, but it does involve adopting a view of life that we have some agency when it comes to our emotions.  We are not adrift in a sea of misery. We have a rudder, sails and even oars if necessary -- we can navigate!  Physical movement is a great navigation tool.  Remember the penguin in Happy Feet?  I used to love to run as a child.  It made me happy.  When I need a "pick me up" I literally pick myself up and move.  

And navigation is intimately related to engagement with our environs.  This part is critical because like the flower we are rooted in our environment. I was once told by a motivational speaker that if you look at the 5 people you are closest to you can predict with pretty good accuracy your future.  

• Who are you rooted with? 
• What are the content of those conversations? 
• What are you doing or not doing or know you should be doing but are avoiding doing? 

Yes, relationships.  It takes some time to find your peeps. Is the relationship nurturing? Reciprocal? Expansive. Explorative? It is easy to fall into old stories; especially with old friends.  What keeps the relationship alive?  Is it the past or engagement with the future? How do you celebrate? 

Which is another way of saying what is important? Meaning.  Here's a tip from Seligman,  The self is completely impoverished soil for well-being. If you think about some peak experience where you were happy and in flow of life the odds are you were not alone. It happened in community.  When I consider meaning, of course, I place it in a Quaker context.  I derive enormous well-being, sense of belonging and meaning when I am in a gathered meeting waiting on a message from spirit.  The deep knowing that I am not alone.  I am part of something much greater and infinitely more intelligent than myself.  But to really get the bang the real prize is parlaying that knowing into gifting your time and energy to others. 

Accomplishment.  What are you good at? What can you accomplish?  Do you have the discipline to finish things?  They say it takes 10,000 hours to get good at something and then from there one can aspire to virtuoso or master / legend and pass that skill on. 

I want to end with Nietzsche's three stages of spiritual transformation—the Camel, Lion, and Child—describe human development from obeying others' values (Camel), to rejecting them (Lion, saying "No" to "Thou Shalt"), and finally to creating one's own values (Child, saying "Yes" to life).  

• ARE WE ONLY FOCUSED ON "NOT THAT?" 
• WHAT ARE YOU (WE) A "YES" TO? 
• WHAT ISLE OF SANITY CAN WE SAY "YES" TO (outside of the systems that keep us in the bondage of duality)