The Importance Of A Good Life

Every decision that we make has an effect on one’s life. Simple choices like the clothes we wear to complex decisions like the schools we attend shape our future. Most decisions made by people are to help them achieve success or live a “good life.” The common steps to living a “good life” are going to school to get educated, going to work to support yourself, and retiring to enjoy the remaining years. Just two years ago, I made a decision to go to LASA high school instead of my home school. Why did I do this? I felt that being educated would help me live a “good life.” The problem I had was that I neither understood what a “good life” was, nor did I know how education would help me live a “good life”. The quest for the answer will help me understand more about myself and my values, as well as help me find steps to create the life I want. First we must find what the real value education is. In David Foster Wallace’s “Commencement Address to Kenyon College,” Wallace points out a flaw in the thinking of people that, if overcome, can be used for the better of themselves as well as others. Wallace presents an idea about epistemology, the way we think. He says that people must overcome their “default setting” (Wallace, 3), which is the idea that you are the center of the world and your “immediate needs and feelings are what should determine the world’s priorities” (Wallace, 3). By getting over this default setting, you can “choose to look differently” (Wallace, 4) at situations by establishing “self-awareness” (Wallace, 5) and this gives the “freedom of a real education…learning how to be well adjusted” (Wallace, 4). I think that as human beings, we get caught up in the mundane routine of everyday life and we fall unconscious and rely ... ... middle of paper ... ... science skills that will help me in the medical field in which I want to go into. I think that becoming self-aware is just a positive by-product that the education system gives to students, but there is no doubt that self-awareness is essential to a “good life” in fact I think that the definition of a “good life” is living WITH self-awareness, attention, and discipline. Being self-aware allows for you to stay conscious and awake for every decision, resulting in a fulfilling life because you have mastered your own principle values. Works cited Nawaz, Moe. "What Is Self Awareness?" Mastermind Coach. N.p., n.d.. Web. 23 Jan. 2014. Wallace, David F. “This is Water.” Commencement Speech. Kenyon College. May 21, 2005. Transcription of the 2005 Kenyon Commencement Address. Purdue. n.d.