“I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people who have a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.” Benjamin Button
No one’s life is an accident. Of course, it is chock full of accidental incidents but then, that IS life, right? All the ‘if only that hadn’t happened’ incidents are out of our control but still intersect our lives. So do the people in them. It’s said that we are all connected; a world full of 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon. Spoiler alert: That’s even truer on ‘the other side’ — and I don’t mean across the pond. When this world is in the rear view, we’ll find people from every culture, value system and coloring in a mash-up of everyone who’s ever lived here, there and everywhere. It would probably make sense then, to pay more attention to making friends, or at the very least, acknowledge with kindness some of the souls who’ll be our roommates in eternity.
Life has a time limit but as long as we’re here, why not try? Change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it, we just have to be awake during the ride.
Life can only be understood backward, but it must be lived forward.
Like Benjamin Button, the aging process is pretty much a metaphor. Whether we live our lives backwards or forward, the beginning and end of life is the same. The point is how we live in the dash in between. Anyone who’s lived a near death experience is pretty adamant about not wasting a minute on things that don’t count. Money is a means to an end; not the goal. Work is merely tool to make ours and others’ lives better. Instant gratification isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. Superficial lasts only until it becomes boring. Fear and anxiety are real, as real as the feeling you get going bungee jumping if you’re afraid of heights. Moments shared, kindness multiplied; those are the true fabrics that should weave how we want to live.
If you’ve already been to the dark side, things might be looking up. Heights and closed spaces, trains, planes and autos have no meaning because death is something you’ve been there, done that. Everything is relative.
“Life moves pretty fast sometimes. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it.” Ferris Bueller Continue reading “Channeling Benjamin Button”
The Other Shoe 