If the answer is no, I'm sorry to hear that. Wakers are my favorite people.
A waker is someone who is very good at waking other people up from their metaphorical slumber, temporary or otherwise.
Some people just have the gift. Being around them or their work just makes you feel more alive, more inspired, more motivated, more awake. The best wakers will make you do crazyass things, like quit your boring job and start your own business, write that song, move to Thailand, forgive that someone who once hurt you, or finally tell that girl that you love her.
A waker reminds you on a constant basis just how alive you really are. Just how much human potential you really have inside of you. And their is something about their influence that makes you utterly unable to go back to "sleep" ever again, despite your best efforts.
Wakers can be great artists - Jeff Buckley, Picasso, Harper Lee, Beethoven, Judy Garland, Charlie Parker, Leo Tolstoy, Louis Armstrong, Ralph Steadman, Dorothy Parker, etc. - but they don't have to be.
Wakers can be great spiritual leaders - Jesus, Gandhi, Mohammed, Buddha, the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Joseph Campbell, etc. - but they don't have to be.
Wakers can be great public figures - Steve Jobs, Winston Churchill, Mike Royko, Oprah Winfrey, Carl Sagan, John Peel, Susan Sontag, Alistair Cook, Margaret Thatcher, Bill Murray, etc. - but they don't have to be.
I know great wakers who are bartenders, bus drivers, waitresses, teachers, receptionists, plumbers. Theirs is a gift, not a job title.
If you are a waker, I'm happy for you. There is no better way to spend one's life that being a waker; I truly believe that.
The human race needs you, like flowers need sunshine. The human race would die out within three generations without you. Thanks for being here. Seriously.
If you're not a waker, don't you thing you should be? Serious questions.
-Hugh MacLeod, Evil Plans: Having Fun on the Road to World Domination
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Fantastic....
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