Thursday, June 5, 2008

Tic Tock

If you could know the exact time and date of your death would you want to know? I don't think I have to think about that very long to know that I would not. I suppose there are some advantages to knowing but only if it would change the way we live our lives today, this moment. If you think about it, knowing that you will die 11 years from now isn't any different than not knowing. We all know that death is not probable but certain yet we waste so much of our time pursuing unimportant things. If we measure the success of our lives in terms of wealth or power we miss the boat for there will always be someone who has more. We must follow our passion and our hearts and do what we are excited about. If we measure the success of our lives by the relationships we have made along the way success is likely to follow. Not all of us can find the love of our lives but if you are lucky enough to find the person whose happiness means more than your own cherish them. As Randy Pausch said in his charge to the graduating class of Carnegie Mellon, "We don't beat the reaper by living longer we beat the reaper by living well and living fully. For the reaper will come for all us. The question is what do we do from the time we are born and the time he shows up."

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