Focusing On Being

Originally published in May 2009.

I typically am not the sort of gal who quotes popes. In fact, like many people – and 20-somethings in particular – I’m still in the process of figuring out whether structured religion is worth the old “college try.”

That said, a friend recently shared an idea from Pope John Paul II that seems just about right: “The great temptation [in life] is to concentrate on having and doing, instead of being.”

I first heard this quote while in transit to visit my family in Fairfield, as I made a special trip on a Friday night to tackle a critical topic: Where should my little sister go to college? As the days until the May 1 deadline waned and my mother’s jitters began to mount, we decided that a family meeting, replete with decision charts and testimony from attendees of both colleges in dispute, would be the way to go.

From the time I have spent as a college essay tutor, supporting some wonderful students in their pursuit of thick envelopes from their schools of choice, I have learned how difficult this application and decision-making process can be.

The pressure in Fairfield County is particularly brutal. I once helped a terrific student complete applications to 25 schools to ensure there would be sufficient world-class choices at the ready for him. He ended up at an excellent liberal arts college that wasn’t at first a top choice; but as I told him: “Dan, you can’t go wrong here!”

What makes this college journey so challenging is not really the stressful crunch to “get in,” but rather that a student lays her sense of self-worth on the line as she determines whether she’s “good enough” to attend one of the handful of elite schools that she has been told by advisers, friends and college review books will help her to have and do whatever she’d like in the future. Without this collegiate seal of approval, a student may just as well kiss her future goodbye. Or at least that’s how it feels.

As we sat around the dinner table, hashing out my sister’s two options, becoming embroiled in detail points and personal feelings, the American pressure cooker of competitiveness silently became a key participant in the conversation.

We debated where my sister would be most challenged, where she could grow as a person, where she could discover and fulfill her full potential in academics and beyond. We discussed life after college and which university experience would allow her to “have the most opportunities” and “do the most with her life.”

It wasn’t until many minutes into the conversation that my mother, sage that she is, asked my sister to pause and consider the question: “Honey, where do you think you will be happiest.”

It seems that this critical question easily can get lost in all of the planning and plotting that accompanies “making the most of the future.” Or, maybe more appropriately, that the concept of “being happy” becomes equated with having the greatest number of opportunities, doing all the “right” things to make it to the top, and eventually, accumulating enough wealth to prove the presence of happiness in our lives.

Surely, there is a correlation here. Part of happiness is feeling fulfilled and gratified by opportunities and accomplishments. But what if we learned from the get-go that just “being” also is a major part of our success as human beings? That choosing a school for the personal fit rather than the reputation might make us more content? That leaving work early on occasion for a family dinner, volunteer project, or simply some much needed R&R might make life more complete?

You might say this is ironic coming from an overachieving young woman who has attended great schools, who has chosen to plant herself in the middle of Manhattan’s rat race, and who willingly stays at work far beyond the hours she is required because it’s “good for her.” But if there is one thing that I’m beginning to learn as I figure out how to juggle career ambitions with personal responsibilities, relationships and goals for the future, it is this: The everyday moments of “being” really matter.

During these brief interludes – though clearly unproductive to the naked eye – critical work is being accomplished. It’s the work of regeneration, self-affirmation, and achievement of the centered, grounded quality that allows us to leap forward with intention and prowess. And, perhaps most importantly, it’s a window into that sometimes-elusive path towards happiness.

For me, the window opens when I’m running along the hilly back roads around my parent’s house in Fairfield, spending a night with friends at our favorite bar for their fantastic live music on Thursdays, or sitting quietly on the beach with my family at the Jersey Shore, where we have been spending summers for the last 25 years.

I wonder sometimes, when the window shuts again and I leap back into the rat race, whether “being” is a utopia only certain European countries have truly discovered. But then I consider the simple, uncluttered moment of elation that came when my sister made her college decision, and together we launched into the fight song of her alma mater to be. Happiness incarnate.

Christina Ciocca grew up in Darien and graduated from Greenwich Academy. She works in communications and public relations at The Dilenschneider Group in New York City.