A STORY ABOUT THE MEANING OF LIFE

Fr Jim Cogley

Sometimes we have to lose our way in order to discover where we need to go. The experience of failure can be a prelude to success and an experience of intense suffering can be necessary to wake us up. Recently I took some light reading for a plane journey. It was a little book by John Strelecky called 'The Café on the edge of the World'. It’s one of those simple little books that you can read very quickly but not forget in a hurry. The fact that it has sold over five million copies and been translated into dozens of languages is testimony that it touches a nerve in the society of our time. Even in a life that is apparently quite full there can be an alarming sense of unfulfillment. A life that appears on the outside to be like a doughnut can be felt like the hole. Appearances can be very deceptive as the human heart remains restless until it finds its home.

The story behind the man in The Cafe on the edge of the World was of someone who was well educated, successful and fast climbing his way up the corporate ladder. Yet he found himself in an uncertain state of mind and wondering if he was beginning to trade his life for money and realizing that it was no longer feeling like a good deal. Like so many young successful people today he was wondering if there was more to life than working ten hours a day looking at a computer screen in a cubicle with the potential of getting a promotion that would involve needing to work even extra hours. He had followed the advice of an earlier generation who believed that education was the way out of poverty and that being successful and having plenty of money was the key to happiness and fulfillment. Slowly it had dawned on him that at the heart of success lay a hole that he was fast falling into.

Its amazing how if we have eyes to see our outer life will begin to mirror our inner reality. Our café friend decided to take time out instinctively knowing that he could be heading for burnout. He finds himself on a highway with traffic first reduced to a crawl and then to a stop. It was as if his inner life was slowing down and coming to a standstill. Rather than blame and complain about the delay like his fellow travelers he took ‘a road less travelled’ even though he had no idea where it might lead. This was like a journey of faith that seemed to go on forever with little that seemed familiar and a sense that he was no longer in charge of his destiny. Even the needle of his fuel gauge dropping so rapidly reflected his ego strength that was fast declining and paving the way for something new and wonderful to begin.

Eventually after what seemed an eternity travelling on old desolate roads and his fuel supply almost depleted our character in the novel comes across a café called The Café of Questions situated in the middle of the middle of nowhere. This is like coming home to his heart where nowhere is now-here and he is finally present to himself. At this point he is well and truly lost but is also in the best possible place for his heart to be open to the questions it most needs to ask. These questions he finds written on the back of the menu while he is deciding what to order: Why are you here? Do you fear death and are you

fulfilled? It is these questions that begin to stir something very deep, and he realizes that he wasn’t there just to have his physical hunger satisfied. Particularly the first question was one that he would spend the rest of his life answering. It would become part of his being, one that he would wake up with in the morning, have it with him during the day and even think about it in his sleep. This was the question that once opened it would be like a gateway and would beckon him for the rest of his life.

Slowly our friend in the novel comes to realize that once a person comes to know why they are here; the reason for their existence, then it will follow that they will spend the rest of their life wanting to fulfill that reason. Here he also sees that without having an understanding of why we’re here, and what we want to do, we just end up doing what most people are doing and expect of us. So, we become prisoners of external norms and agendas. This is our innate vulnerability that makes us fall prey to the advertising agenda. Advertisers know that by focusing on peoples’ fears and their desire to be fulfilled they can motivate them to buy specific goods and use specific services. The overt message is that it you have this product you will be fulfilled and there is also a more subtle covert message, that not having this product will keep you from being fulfilled.