People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive. – Joseph Campbell
I love this life goal…to “feel the rapture of being alive”, to be transparent to transcendence. However, in my three decades in venture capital, I have never witnessed this level of systemic upheaval. It is a moment of profound technological and societal transition. While it promises immense opportunity, that opportunity is currently masked by acute, collective anxiety. I have long observed that our lives move in predictable eight-to-ten-year cycles (Managing Life’s 8-10 Cycle) the bushfire sweeps through our work, love, home and family. But the sheer velocity of our current cycle feels epically larger and unstable. Rapture could not feel further away.
In a world accelerating through AI and uncertainty, how do we stay fully alive?
Productivity over Presence. In a frantic attempt to regain control, we default into “Survival Mode.” We accelerate, do more, and inadvertently disconnect from the people we love and from ourselves. Terry Real says “Most of us were never taught how to stay present in difficult moments…because our nervous systems learned survival long before they learned connection.” Ironically, many tools promising freedom seem only to make us busier, more distracted, and less present.
The antidote to this modern sickness was discovered millennia ago: we do not need to move faster; we need to slow down and connect deeper. True vitality requires three essential pillars:
- Awe: The transcendent moment where you sense divine beauty in everyday moments.
- Presence: Anchoring of your full consciousness in the current minute, staying perfectly still and receiving the now as an unmerited gift.
- Connection: Deepening your true intimacy with those who love you, knowing you don’t have to endure the storm alone.
Our dog, Beau, taught me this on my last walk with him. I wrote about it in The Lesson from Beau’s Final Walk. He literally smelled the flowers and stopped to feel the wind on his fur…then looked at me to follow.
Pleasure’s Different Forms
I had a recent debate with someone dear to me. We mixed it up around pleasure vs growth/forward progress as the pathway to happiness. Research supports that forward progress in our lives, especially while serving others, leads to deeper levels of contentment. It also supports that hedonic pleasures (vices), busyness and avoidance numbs us from truly feeling life and leads to depression and worse.
She pointed out that this missed positive pleasure (vs vices) such as a hike that takes your breath away, intimate slow mornings, a shared meal with people that matter, laughing until it hurts. I agree with her assertion that the current quest for “More” (money, power, homes, things, etc) is hollowing out life. She pushed back with an essential truth: if that vertical pursuit becomes an obsession with forward progress, it becomes growth for growth’s sake…the Hedonic treadmill (I’ll be happy when). The Survival Mode accelerator bolted to the car floor. Action, achievement and progress become the addictive Anesthesia to not feel pain and fear and gain a false sense of “control”.
The Pleasure test is simple. Ask yourself “does this expand me or numb me?”
- Expansion: do you feel…More alive, More connected, More present, More grateful
- Numbing: do you feel…More compulsive, More distracted, More disconnected, Avoiding feelings
Stringing Together Optimal Moments into a Meaningful Life
Bill Burnett and Dave Evans rewrote their Design Your Life Book (TED Talk) into How to Design a Meaningful Life (Santos/Evans Interview on it). Students and executives at Stanford were doing their 5 step Design methodology to rebuild their lives and were still feeling empty without meaning & purpose.
How do I get Unstuck? —> How do I feel fully Alive?
At the start of their process, they ask you to assess how ALIVE you are (1-10) in Health, Work, Play and Love. A well-lived life is not a major series of self-optimizations or treating the present as a mere stepping stone to the future. It is feeling ALIVE in each moment and stringing them together towards your North Star. Also, Meaning comes from coherence—when who you are, what you believe, and what you are doing line up.
- Be fully present in the moment.
- Look for awe in that moment
- Connect deeply with those around you
When you layer deep presence, awe, and genuine connection onto that northern trajectory, you trigger the psychological state of flow. The true beauty of flow is that you no longer have to choose between fulfillment and achievement; you get both joy and performance simultaneously. When you are anchored in the current minute, things begin to happen seamlessly rather than being anxiously driven. You stop forcing progress through sheer friction and start gliding through it with an effortless, high-velocity clarity. More importantly, you bring joy and the Divine into the moment.
The Reality of the Grind: Survival vs. Agency
When you are in the thick of a crisis, the concept of “presence” just sounds out of reach. It sounds like an insulting, high-level luxury. It feels like advice tailored exclusively for people who have the time, safety, and financial padding to sit on a cushion and contemplate their breathing.
When dealing with divorce, business failure, health issues, family stressors or economic hardship, your biology takes over. You don’t get a choice; your nervous system slams into survival mode.
Yet, precisely because this survival mode is autonomic and also so consuming, reclaiming your aliveness (presence, awe, connection) becomes an even more essential, non-negotiable need. When the external world strips away all predictability, hyper-vigilance, busyness, anxiety, achievement, independence keeps your soul isolated and your mind perpetually trapped in a future you cannot control and a past you cannot rewrite. Choosing to slow down and command the current minute is not a soft luxury—it is a fierce act of internal sovereignty and the only way to disrupt the adrenaline loop, ensuring that the crisis does not completely hollow out your humanity before the storm finally passes.
A Blueprint for Presence
Here are some simple exercises you can do for Presence, Awe, Connection & Flow:
- Deepen with Your Partner (Oxytocin Reset): Every night, for five minutes before sleep, hold your partner’s hand, look deeply into their eyes, and just talk. It rewires your brains & marriage. Arthur Brooks Four Ideas to Fix Your Marriage, Treasure those closest to you; never let them doubt your love.
- Move Without Distraction: Slow down your workout, drop down in weight (usually 10 lbs) and slowly do the lift. Feel your muscles engage, keep pressure on them and move slowly. Leave the phone behind. I lift almost daily now and do so digitally free. My workouts have become both more regenerative and more effective.
- Look for the Good: Notice the good in others. Spend a morning and for everyone you meet, instead of assessing their actions, motives or intent, simply enjoy their presence. Look for small things to appreciate in them. Look for Awe. Smile.
- Dharma Walk: Go for a slow walk or hike with a friend. Agree to a topic you want to go deep on. For the path out, they talk and you can only ask clarifying questions (no statements or advice). On the way back, reverse roles. Be present and curious.
- Deliberate Eating: Share a meal with someone dear. Savor the food, note the flavors and smells, be present with them, be curious and look for parts of the meal or them that create a sense of awe.
Perhaps the real challenge of this accelerating age is not simply learning how to move faster—but remembering how to feel alive while we are moving at all.
Look for awe. Stay present to the people you love. Let this ordinary Tuesday matter more than you think it does. A meaningful life is not built all at once. It is strung together, one fully lived moment at a time.