“Some day soon, perhaps in forty years, there will be no one alive who has ever known me. Thats when I will be truly dead - when I exist in no ones memory. I thought a lot about how someone very old is the last living individual to have known some person or cluster of people. When that person dies, the whole cluster dies,too, vanishes from the living memory. I wonder who that person will be for me. Whose death will make me truly dead?” ― Irvin D. Yalom This is why its so important to DO something of importance with your life - create or add to something that matters and that will live on. Life is fleeting - and yet we stress out SO much about every moment instead of just living and enjoying. Sometimes we forget what is really important and just go along doing what we think we are supposed to do instead of what we really NEED to do for our soul. An example from my own life: A few weeks ago I was feeling particularly stressed out from worries & fears I have been dealing with, and in the morning while I was getting my son ready for school with a million things ahead that I had to deal with I lost it. My son did something wrong - I dont even remember what it was - and I got incredibly angry with him, yelled, chastised him and told him to get in the car so I could take him to school and not have to deal with him any more. On the way to school my son was so quiet - very unlike him. As I dropped him off at the school gate he tentatively hugged me - unsure if I would respond - and then forlornly walked up to class. My son is rarely ever upset, only ever cries if hes badly hurt (never from tantrums or mood swings or sorrow) and tends to be a very upbeat, happy and positive kid. To see him looking so utterly depressed was heart-breaking and I knew it was because Id done the wrong thing & taken out my frustration on him. Thats so often the case - that we punish those closest to us for the emotions we cannot cope with - but it doesnt make it right. I went home and I cried. I felt so bad. Suddenly all that mattered was making things right with my son - my work could wait, my money issues could wait, my to-do list a mile long could wait - and school could wait. None of that mattered in that moment - all that mattered is the I reconnected with the person I love most in the world and let him know that he really didnt deserve the way I had treated him. So I went back to his school - took him out of class (at 9.10am mind you!) much to his teachers confusion (I told her it was a personal matter) and took him home. I sat him down and told him that I was sorry, I had been far too harsh and said things I shouldnt have said. I told him he didnt deserve that and it wasnt his fault - that I was having a bad day, and we all have bad days sometimes, but seeing his sad little face made me realise that the bad day wasnt important - only HE was important. We both cried, we hugged, we talked about our feelings. And then we went to Dreamworld, a theme park here on the Gold Coast. We had the best day - it was a Friday and the park was quite empty. We went on all the rides, ran through water and got soaking wet, ate crappy, over-priced theme park food and walked around singing & dancing to music. Then we came home and snuggled up in bed watching a movie that night. And as I tucked my little man into bed that night, he told me that hed just had the best day of his life - and threw his arms around my neck telling me how much he loved me and that I was the best Mum in the world. And now here we are a few weeks later and my life isnt any less worrisome or stressful - but Im no longer letting that affect whats really important to me. All I have to do is think about the look on my sons face when I made him feel small & rejected & unloved and I feel so much shame that I know I will never do that again. My point in sharing this story with you all is: Part of life is about surviving - making enough money to live, having a roof over your head and being able to support yourself & your family. But its mostly about LIVING. Yet we all tend to give too much of our energy to the surviving part - and letting that part affect our emotions and our state of mind - rather than actually living and giving of our time & energy to the things that have the power to give everything else in our lives meaning. At the end of the day, life is short and everything we are stressing about right now will mean nothing to anyone in 40 years from now - maybe not even in 10 years from now! So why give the inconsequential things so much power over you? I dont have all the answers - Im still learning every day of this life - but that was a big lesson for me and I hope that sharing makes you reassess your own life and your own choices and make some positive changes
Posted on: Fri, 28 Nov 2014 23:33:31 +0000
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