When did you first really begin to think about the fact that life is ephemeral? In particular, when did you begin to reflect on your accomplishments, your failures and just how little time might be left to make a difference? We all know that death is a fact of life. It is one thing to say the words or think the thoughts about our own demise from the distance of youth and health.
It’s very different to face each day with a bit of foreboding as we experience more and more indicators that our time on this earth is fleeting and that each day is a gift. As positive as our thinking is and no matter how strong our faiths are, it is a bit scary to realize that we are not quite ready for the next step. Most of us have had a few close calls and happily the man upstairs let us know that it wasn’t our time yet. At some time though, it will be our time.
When we were young, we thought we were invincible. We all took chances and made choices that put us in danger. Some of us even reached midlife, approaching each day in a similar fashion to that of our youth. We were proud of our courage and our abilities and we thrived on our strengths and accomplishments. So, what is it that happens to change our awareness of our own transient lives? Some of us have had near death experiences, accidents or illnesses that spawned a consciousness of our own mortality. It is not about those experiences that I am speaking. Rather, I am talking about healthy and somewhat normal people, who are just walking along the paths in front of them, one foot ahead of the other.
As they make their way through their days, they learn from or ignore the pieces of evidence that offer the details of what is truly important in life. As the aging process saturates my days, I notice that some people become happier as each day passes. Many of their counterparts fight the aging process every second of every day. They are the ones who fall prey to crises and surgeries in hopes of finding that fountain of youth. Maybe the catalyst in this new way of thinking is because of new or different experiences.
Maybe it is a divorce from an unhappy marriage, maybe it’s realizing that we can’t and don’t want to control anyone except ourselves, maybe it is seeing people die who shouldn’t have died or maybe it is experiencing true love for the first time. So when did you begin to think about this or have you not gotten there yet?
