Don't Wait For The Diagnosis

Appreciation.

We've often heard the cliche of how important it is to appreciate the small mundane things in life. Yawn. There's nothing new about that. Sure, we can appreciate that sip of tea, notice how are feet feel as we step across the cool kitchen floor, enjoy our morning stretch in bed, and listen to birdsong carried by the breeze from the open window as we lazily wake from our sleepiness. We can stop to ponder how comforting and simply 'right' the weight of our child's little arm feels as it drapes itself around our neck. We can watch and marvel in silence at the breaths that expand the chest of our loved one as they rest in bed beside us.

The BIG Things in Life

The little things in life are good. No doubt about it. And the power to NOTICE them is vital to our well-being. Consciousness, mindfulness and the ability to be PRESENT in the moment are all based on this art of noticing little things, sensations, details. The are built on the ability to see our ordinary reality though a new lens, to feel intrinsic curiosity and astonishment. Just like a child who sees these things for the very first time.

But how often to we stop to feel gratitude for the BIG things in life? How often do we pause to marvel at ourselves. To feel simple gratitude for the fact that we are a sentient being that through an incredible miracle of life has the opportunity to walk this world and experience it in all its wondor, misery and glory. How often do we feel gratitude for the love we have for others? How often do we really take stock of our lives. What will we truly miss about this world when we know we are soon to depart from it?

Our Demise

It is perhaps difficult to really and truly imagine our demise. We are all destined to die. However, our brain works tirelessly to keep us alive and safe and is always alert and planning for the future. So, to really fathom our END, is quite inconceivable. Religion and the concept of an afterlife help of course. They find a way around this 'dead'-end. (Sorry for the pun!) and allow for some hazy concept of a future, for our soul.

Certainty As a Blessing

A short story: A few years back, a good friend of my boss got terrible and unsuspected news one day. At just 45 he was told he had a terminal illness and had just a few months to live. My boss, a wonderful and wise woman, went to see him in hospital. Now you can imagine how tremendously hard that can be. For some people, it is too difficult and painful to visit people with such a diagnosis. They cannot do it, even in the case of good friends or close family and sadly, they stay away. Many lack the courage to look the other in the eye. They fail to avoid showing pity and struggle to find the right words. There is of course so little consolation, if any.

My boss however said: 'You know, we're all in the same boat. We're all going to die soon. It may be tomorrow, it may be next year or in twenty years time. You on the other hand have the advantage of knowledge. You have the certainty of knowing WHEN that will be. You will plan, you will make conscious decisions, you will use the time efficiently, you will make amends, you will say your goodbyes. You will leave this life with your held held high, CONSCIOUSLY, deliberately, rather than being chucked out unexpectedly, like the rest of us.'

The Illusion of Time

We all think we have more time. Our rationality cannot fathom our coming demise. We put it off and shoo it off in our thoughts as something unreal, vague, unreal, with no sharp contours or shape. We don't want to sit down and contemplate the exact circumstances. How will it be, with all its details. How will it be for our loved ones. Death itself has been expelled from our thoughts. It lurks at the outskirts of society. We encounter it during the rare moments when we attend funerals.

The knowledge of ones impending death can be useful. Many people who were given the diagnosis of a terminal illness reported that time began to flow at a different pace. If, at 60 you are given 5 years to live, that seems incredibly unfair and cruel. You had so much more to do, you have children to support, places to go, goals to achieve! You should have got at least 20 more years! You are enraged.

Now imagine, you are given 5 months to live. Just as cruel and tragic. You had so much more planned for yourself. Now picture, as an acquaintance of mine did, that by some miracle you outlive this terrible diagnosis and are told your body has stabilised and you may potentially have another 5 years to live. How long do those 5 years feels now?

Abundance Versus Scarcity.

What use will you make of the time you have? A popular theory called Parkinson's Law says that the task at hand will expand to fill the time allocated to it. The same is true of our lives. If you envisage that you have buckets of time, you will treat your life in this way. Each day and each moment not of great value. Expendable, since you have so many more. However, we no not how much time we have been allocated. Out clocks are all ticking. Our time is indeed scarce. Abundance versus scarcity.

You are in good health, you live in a safe part of the world, you feel fortunate and secure? Good for you. What it you proverbally get hit by a bus tomorrow or fall off a ladder? Our sense of safety is false. It is there to enable us to function in every day life. If we thought about our own mortality and fragility every moment of the day, we would be paralysed and unable to live. But this consciousness of our impending end is important and useful. We should take a moment, perhaps during morning meditation or at the end of the day, to feel gratitude for what we have and know that tomorrow we may be gone.

Treat your life here with the respect it deserves. Treat your allocated time here upon this earth as a valuable resource. Counterintuitive as it may sound, it is the feeling of SCARCITY not abundance, that will lend your life meaning and purpose.