I wonder if it is me who picks a topic or a topic that picks me. This one for December is a challenge. At the Quaker meeting this past Sunday a person who had just lost a very old and beloved grandfather asked this question: “What completes a Life?” It is a big question and I hope you will mull it with me this month.
Phrases Posted on Facebook December 2025
The first thing that comes to mind is that when we graduate (as my brother-in-law would put it) we go on. We have had an impact on many people and therefore there is no permanent completion, just other ways that our life continues to unfold without our bodies.
I think that “alive” in the here and now we are already complete if we can sense it. Take friendships, for instance. Are we not made complete by friends . . . our love for them and theirs for us? Any moment this is truly felt is a confirmation, a completion. When love takes over ,things become realized and complete us.
I think of teachers that have been part of my life and helped complete me up to this very moment as I write this post for Facebook. I wouldn’t be who I am without their wisdom and care. I love thinking that in deep relationships we continue to complete one another even when we no longer see one another. What a gift is that!
Here’s one by Regina Ryan about gratitude. For me gratitude is the great completer. She says, “Gratitude is so close to the bone of life, pure and true, that it instantly stops the rational mind, and all its planning and plotting.” Amen
I have always admired Gwendolyn Brooks. To me this is quote is certainly about what completes us. “We are each other’s harvest: we are each other’s business: we are each other’s magnitude and bond.”
I love the thought that play completes us. What a wonderful concept from Brother David Steindl-Rast. “Play has no purpose, only meaning. And there is no end to meaning. Once we open our eyes to this, we won’t be concerned with “discovering the purpose of human life. Rather, we will celebrate its meaning.”
This quote by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel tells us we are already complete just by being. “Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.”
Peace Pilgrim trusted herself to encourage and share peace by walking hundreds of miles to talk to anyone about it. She only had her tunic and a toothbrush in the pocket. There’s no doubt in my mind she felt complete in her mission. Not all of us have missions, but we can complete each day with a sense of peace following Peace Pilgrim’s advice. “Live in the present. Do the things that need to be done. Do all the good you can each day. The future will unfold.”
Here’s a quote from the wonderful poet, Wendell Berry. I think it is about claiming completeness no matter what: “Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.”
These wise words from Charles Epstein teach us how more and more personal completion happens: “Ultimately, work on self is inseparable from work inn the world. Each mirrors the other; each is a vehicle for the other. When we change ourselves, our values and actions change as well.”
Here’s a paradoxical take on completion from the eminent J. Krishnamurti. “If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes transformation.”
Poets have a way of saying things that can hum inside us. Here’s Adrienne Rich talking about what keeps making for continuation and completeness. This one moves me. “My heart is moved by all I cannot save: so much has been destroyed, I have to cast my lot with those who age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.
Zen Master Dogen ‘s wisdom tells us we’re complete right now. “Since there is nothing but this moment, the time-being is all the time there is.” Let’s live it completely.
At the end of our lives what we can offer is whatever completeness we have arrived at. It is a gift back to the Universe. How we have spent our lives matters. Here’s a quote from Nimo Patel: “We arrive on this planet empty-handed, and we will all soon leave empty-handed. So then, how and in what spirit do we want to spend the time between?
I can think of no better advice than from Rumi to bring us to the completeness we long for in our lives. “Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.”
It’s good to have the preference that big and little both have equal value and make for completion. Here’s a quote by Morgan Harper Nichols: “Living in the moment is learning how to live between the big moments. It is learning how to make the most of the in-betweens and having the audacity to make those moments just as exciting.
Here’s a quote from one of my favorite spiritual writers, Simone Weil. She tells us about a process of completion in the soul that is beyond precious. “Even if our efforts of attention seem for years to be producing no result, one day a light that is in exact proportion to them will flood the soul.”
It’s the last day of the year. We’ve completed another round, and it is time to bless what we’ve learned and develop it further in2026. It seems completion is never over!! Blessings and Happy New Year to everyone.
