experience of life

How does one experience life?

That’s what came to mind as I woke up today—a quiet but persistent question echoing within me. I began by trying to answer it practically, even analytically: life is a collection of experiences, isn’t it? It’s a series of moments strung together like beads on an invisible thread, but what kind of pattern are they creating? Is it vibrant and full, or am I merely filling in the empty spaces?

I started to wonder how different life might feel if I were somewhere far away. Suppose I were in Croatia right now—sipping coffee on the terrace of a stone café overlooking the Adriatic. The experience would be entirely different. There’s something about being in a new place that loosens the grip of routine, pulling you out of yourself. On holiday, you feel lighter, happier, and somehow more complete. It’s as if the simple act of stepping into a new space rewires your senses and invites you to feel again.

But here, now—life has a treadmill quality to it. Day after day, I find myself walking in the well-worn grooves of a routine I designed for efficiency. Life becomes about maintaining order, keeping things contained and predictable. It’s not quite normality I’m after—it’s something calmer, more manageable, something that makes sense. I find myself wanting to keep life tame, and yet as I think about it, I wonder if this desire for control and predictability is leading me to merely exist rather than truly live.

Maybe it’s what Helen Keller meant when she said, “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.” Her words suggest that life should have an element of risk, an unpredictability that reminds us of our aliveness. But what does it mean to make life adventurous? How can we craft an experience of life that isn’t just about indulging in luxury or seeking temporary highs?

It makes sense, then, why we turn to stories, to narratives that sweep us up and away. TV, movies, books—they all transport us into worlds where emotions run high, where stakes feel real, where, for a moment, we’re deeply involved in something beyond the ordinary rhythms of daily life. These mediums stir something within us, inviting us to feel emotions we might not otherwise encounter in our neatly contained existence.

There’s a sort of comfort in consuming these manufactured experiences. If life outside doesn’t seem to generate the peaks and valleys we crave, we might reach for something stronger—alcohol, drugs, or even the thrill of an illicit affair—to remind us what it’s like to feel. These pursuits give us glimpses of exhilaration, euphoria, and sometimes desperation—emotions that, while fleeting, provide a reprieve from the monotony of “just existing.” They offer an intensity we can’t find in the controlled, ordered lives we work so hard to maintain.

Yet, as seductive as these highs can be, I find myself coming back to the quieter, more enduring alternatives. Meditation, for instance, seems to be one way of re-entering the experience of life from a place of calm rather than frenzy. Meditation allows us to step off the treadmill entirely, if only for a few minutes, and confront the sensation of being without needing to achieve or control anything.

In the stillness of meditation, we encounter ourselves differently—not as a collection of habits or accomplishments but as something simply present, something that can hold calm and chaos alike without clinging or rejecting. It feels like an antidote to the zombie-like trance of routine because, in meditation, every breath reminds you that you are alive in the present moment. And in that presence, there’s a hint of adventure—a feeling of potential, like anything could arise and be felt fully.

So, how do we make life feel like a daring adventure? Perhaps it starts with a willingness to go beyond mere existence, to risk encountering the parts of life we can’t control or predict. It might mean saying “yes” to something unknown, to trading comfort for curiosity, to leaning into moments of vulnerability rather than always scrambling to restore order.

Maybe it also involves creating a space for silence in our lives, a silence that invites all the scattered, overlooked pieces of our experience to return home to us. In that silence, we might find that life is waiting patiently beneath the surface of our routines, inviting us back into its unfiltered depths, where each moment is an experience waiting to be felt, fully and completely.

Recently, I introduced my friend Dave to The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart. It’s a curious book—a cult classic of sorts—centred on a psychiatrist who decides to let the roll of a die determine his every decision. The story unfolds into a wild exploration of identity, freedom, and the unforeseen outcomes of letting chance run the show. It’s one of those books that feels like both a liberating read and a dangerous suggestion, tempting you to take a roll of the dice into your own hands, which is exactly what I’m about to do again as a life experiment.

So here’s my thought: for the next month, I’m going to dice again. I’ll let the die be my guide and see where it takes me. Maybe it’s a step towards making life feel more like an adventure and less like a treadmill, a way of injecting unpredictability back into the ordinary. Who knows where it will lead—new experiences, new thought patterns, even behaviours I’d never consider otherwise.

Maybe that’s the beauty of it: relinquishing just a little control to see what life has in store, trusting that something meaningful might unfold, one roll at a time.