Monday, November 16, 2015

Day 1: A Year to Live

Today is Monday, November 16, 2015, and...

I have 365 days to live.


Let me clarify:


I'm not saying I've been diagnosed with a terminal illness that will take my life one year from now.  I'm saying that I've come to a point on my life-path that I'm assessing what that means, having a "life path"...


What is this thing called LIFE?  What is the point of it?  What are we supposed to be doing with it?  These are questions I've been circling around for years... and then...


Yesterday, at church, our minister challenged us with these queries:

Would you want to know the exact day you were going to die?
and
If you did know it, what would it inspire you to do?

Oh, boy....


His question made me wonder if I'd want to know that about myself.  I have to admit, my initial reaction was no (as most people's reaction is), but....the more I thought about it...the more I realized that I actually did want to know the day that would be my final day.  Maybe that's macabre and maybe I'm playing with fire by admitting that, but I really do think I'd like to know.


Because, if I knew....I TRULY believe that it would spur me on to live, to REALLY LIVE, in the time I had left.


So...


What am I waiting for?  Why can't I face my future with a fierce determination to wring the maximum life out of each day, even without a specific "X-number of months left" diagnosis falling over me?   Why can't I go ahead and live each day as if it were my last?  Why can't I appreciate every moment, every breath, every teeny-tiny-itty-bitty aspect of my world RIGHT NOW?  If I started to truly realize that the clock WAS ticking,  would I change myself?  Would I quit my job and take up a cause?  Would I become more loving?  Be more forgiving?  Get peaceful or more brash or more patient or more kind?


I have no idea, but....I want to see.


So, for the next 365 days, I am committing to a life fully lived.  Each of the days, over the next year, are gifts.  MY gifts.  I want to open each one with excitement and with appreciation.  I want to see how, by keeping the idea of impending finality present in my life, I can be (in that life) more present.  I want to honor this length of days, whatever mine may be, by lengthening my joy of them.


Here's to life, then.  My life.  For the next 365 days.








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