The Examined Life seeks to elicit and explore questions from some of today’s most interesting thinkers.  The project draws on the wisdom of  academics, artists, activists and politicians from across the globe.

Each contributor has been asked to distill their concerns, passions or preoccupations into a single question that we should be asking ourselves.

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The Examined Life seeks to elicit and explore questions from some of today’s most interesting thinkers.  The project draws on the wisdom of  academics, artists, activists and politicians from across the globe.

Each contributor has been asked to distill their concerns, passions or preoccupations into a single question that we should be asking ourselves.

“I wonder if a core part of being human is to be broken, to fail, to falter; to have a sense of, yet fall short of, an ineffable ideal.”
“To be human is to imagine, to be human is to love, to be human is to dare to journey, to be curious, to be in community...to be in communion. It is an endless fascination, this exploration of being-ness and being with other.”
“I wonder if what we call ‘spirituality’ is the name we give for our awareness of the immensity of and mystery of existence?”
“All tolerance will ever do is create superficial peace where we put up with one another, but we only do that because we don’t really engage with each other.”
“Living generously in the world involves a degree of openness, a degree of crossing thresholds and engaging in communities of difference.”
“I think the real question is how people reason their own place within the world, and trying to reason with them on their own grounds.”
“The more you think in this way, the more you downgrade your present desires, and increase the long term perspective on your life. It is that long term perspective where your happiness and fulfilment reside.”
“I’m not saying that there are not other important questions. But if we can’t give an answer to this one, then we won’t be able to give an answer to all the others, about what is more important as such.”