If you haven’t wished for death at least once in your lifetime, you haven’t lived
Cynically Jaded
Tag: death
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death,When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
Steve Jobs. (via quotetheunquotable)
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jmak:
Thanks, Steve.
Posting designs like this one makes me paranoid, because I can’t shake the feeling that it’s not original. I enjoyed the process regardless, but please let me know if somebody else beat me to the idea!
Thoughts?
(Source: http://jmak.tumblr.com) -
When I am dead, my dearest
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget.~ Christina Rossetti
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Where…
Feels like I’ve lost my way in life. The certainty of purpose and conviction that I always relied upon when faced with uncertainty has faded. I look around me and see no reason to be a part of anything or anyone’s lives. I’m the sore thumb, the square peg for the round hole, the ugly duckling…no place feels like home, and through it all I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve become the ingrate that I’ve always despised in others.
There’s opportunities presenting themselves almost daily for me to shake off the past and move forward again, like I’ve done so many times before. Only, I don’t want to. I don’t trust myself enough to commit to anything or anyone. Commitment in the most superficial context is also too daunting. I’m afraid to raise my expectations about anything that isn’t immediately apparent, unless it’s entirely inanimate in nature.
I don’t trust anyone. And I don’t want to either. My impulsiveness and naive determination to do everything in full measures or not at all has damaged me. I’m damaged. And I’m done…but death is being selfish, and peace is a pipe dream. There’s a turmoil in my chest that leaves me unsettled and…lost.
I keep picturing a quiet spot, light golden brown sand, tanned golden gates, isolated and remote, not located more than a few hand spans from the gates leading into heaven. And I have no inclination to want to proceed beyond that point. There’s expectations beyond that, expectations I can’t even bear to contemplate. So I yearn just for that little corner, without anything, without any needs, without any desires to be fulfilled…to just be left in peace, untouched and untroubled…that’s all I want from heaven. Nothing else.
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Elusive
If the inevitability of death merely heralds the inevitability of eternity, then I must ask myself, “What do I want from eternity?”
More than happiness,
more than comfort,
I want peace.
Not peace in knowing that I have everything I need,
or everything I want,
but peace in not needing anything or wanting anything…
no contention, no yearning, no expectations.
Just the absence of clutter,
the absence of noise,
the absence of unfulfilled expectations,
and more than anything, the absence of needing to trust.
Instead, the presence of silence without a need to break it.
No needs, no wants, no desires, no anything,
just…peace.