Nia Vardalos once said ‘You only get one life so you might as well make it a happy one, and that's why I tend to just jump into things. I'm sort of a fearless idiot that way.’ It is a cliché which we have heard from time immemorial that life is short. But how many of us actually live our day to day lives like we’re really going to die one day? Aware that this thing called life is fleeting, and more importantly, a non-rehearsal.
Many of us live lives filled with tedium, responsibilities, and unpleasant chores. We spend so much of our mental energy just getting through each day that it’s easy to forget that our time on earth is finite, that each moment we fritter away is a moment we will never get back. This is a reality that though many are aware of, has not really sunk in.
Everything you desire in life has a price and you have to be willing to accept that price. If you desire to do great work, it will cost you. Likewise, security and comfort will cost you. If you want a luxury apartment with a wrap-around sectional couch in leather with stainless steel legs, it will cost you. In the same vein, there is a cost for not living your life to the fullest. Days will be drudging and hardly rewarding if you live this way. It is important that whatever career path you take in life, you don’t lose your spark and adventure.
There is an avalanche of literature that preaches on the need to be careful in life and lead a conservative life. The real question, however, is what is the price of throwing caution to the wind? Often time, it is not as huge as your mind or people will make you believe. However, to not do is to never know. It goes without saying that there is a plethora of people who had the Facebook ‘kind’ dream before Mark Zuckerberg, who conceived the blogging pattern before Linda Ikeji, and the list is endless. The difference is that Mark and Linda did something, understanding that it is much more rewarding to fail and try than to have done nothing, to have never ventured.
Taking a creative risk and stepping off the status quo treadmill requires bravery. It demands embracing risk, and fighting the good fight to face your fears of financial doom without bailing at the first sign of discomfort. The discomfort is just a test. In Bert’s Commencement Speech titled ‘Define Your Own Success and Go Against Life’s Comfort Zone’ he made a striking remark “First, “cool” is way overrated. Cool is a filter that allows inhibitions and prevents you from doing what you REALLY want to do because you feel you’ll be judged. I never got on a dance floor when I was younger for fear I’d be laughed at. I married a woman that loves to dance and I now wonder how many memories I’ve lost by not sharing a dance floor with the woman I love most. Every time you allow cool to win, you cheat yourself of living life to its fullest on your own terms. Which brings me to this. Live life to the fullest on your own terms. Pioneer your own way. Trail blaze your unique path. Others’ social rules can’t apply to you because none of us have the same DNA. Go against what’s popular. Be brave enough to be questioned because you went against life’s comfort zone.”
If you ask me, the best way to start living each day to the fullest, and the best way to live life to the fullest, it is to live your life from the end. To contemplate deeply on the truth of impermanence and to admit to yourself that “What is born will die, what has been gathered will be dispersed, what has been accumulated will be exhausted, what has been built up will collapse, and what has been high will be brought low.” ~ Sogyal Rinpoche. Because only when you understand that you have a limited time here on this Earth and only when you admit to yourself that you’re not going to live forever you will start to live each day to the fullest… loving and appreciating yourself, your life and the world around you and making the best of everything life has to offer you. We only get one life. Don’t spend it all at work. Forget working 24/7 and giving 200%. Be great at your job but try things that are outside of work too. An adventurous life is a life well spent, because 15 years from now when you look back over your life, you will regret more the things you didn’t do, than the things you did. The opportunities you allowed go by, the kind words you left unspoken, the places you didn’t visit, the hobby you didn’t pursue, the adventure you didn’t explore and the family time you didn’t spend are all the kind of regrets that can come with always playing it safe. It is true that we only have one life but if we live it to the utmost fullest, it should well be enough.
Randy Pausch, in his 2008 Carnegie Mellon Commencement Speech made a fitting admonition “We don’t beat the Grim Reaper by living longer, we beat the Reaper by living well and living fully, for the Reaper will come for all of us. The question is what do we do between the time we are born and the time he shows up.”
(Culled from my book ‘The Path Less Travelled’ https://www.amazon.com/Path-Less-Travelled-Reflections-Learning/dp/1540663507v ).
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