Foundations 4: Calling and Wholeness

The language of vocation comes from the Latin “vocari”: “calling.” It is a word we use often at On Being as a pointer for the way forward. In Western culture, vocation has long been equated with work and with job title. But each of us is called not merely to be a professional, but to be a friend, neighbor, colleague, family, citizen, lover of the world. We are called to creativity and caring and play and service for which we will never be paid — or never be paid enough — but which will make life worth living. And each of us imprints the people in the world around us, breath to breath and hour to hour, as much in who we are and how we are present as in whatever we do. 

Just as there are callings for a life, there are callings for our time. Every surface of fracture in our world notwithstanding, for us all of life is being revealed in its insistence on wholeness: the organic interplay between our bodies, the natural world, the lives we make, the worlds we create. It is the calling of callings to make that vivid and practical and real, starting inside ourselves and with the lives we’ve been given.

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Consider picking up a journal, or something to record with, when you sit down or step out to listen to this episode. Take it, and the prompts below, as a companion in listening and your life beyond listening. Also: you might invite someone(s) to join you.

Ponder:

Begin to make a list, to muse and write about what in your life is in the category of vocation — your multitudinous callings as a human being. Perhaps as a professional person, but also as a friend, colleague, family, citizen, creative, lover of the world. How would you begin to name and work through your calling for our time?

Practice:

Open wide your imagination, your heart, your energy, your will, to the possibility of wholeness. Walk through your days looking around for and making note of emergent visions and practices of wholeness and wisdom even amidst fracture.

Every surface of fracture in our world notwithstanding, all of life is being revealed in its insistence on wholeness.

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