Re-Imagining Purposeful Living in the Wake of Death.
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Death is the only certainty that we are guaranteed in our lives, yet it is always the most difficult to confront and grieve through.
Recently, this fate was made reality to three lives in my personal and professional life. An 18-year-old whose fate may never be accepted, a 58-year-old whose sudden death has left behind many heavy hearts, and a 67-year-old who finally lost their battle with cancer.
No matter the age or the cause, the impact of the void of that person on those who loved them has been profound. The eulogies and memories shared of these laid-to-rest souls begged a personal reflection of what it means to live a fulfilled life.
How do I want to be remembered? How can I live a more purposeful life? What is most important to me, and where on life’s continuum am I to achieving those things?
While life should always be visualized as a long sandy beach waiting for footprints to determine a path, these deaths reminded me that time is not infinite. That is a difficult reality to reckon with
as I have always believed in the gift of the wait and that the natural unfolding of things will happen as they are meant to.
It is easy to see how death can make people feel rushed or panicked against the speed of the clock, and there may not be a bridge to connect my questions and time with. Perhaps life is a drawbridge that continually connects and retracts as the ships sail.
What I do know is that life is a gift, and the only way to enjoy the gift of life is to spread it as abundantly and freely as we can with those whom we most cherish. Sharing our gift is more special than the gift itself.
When I asked someone dear to me recently if they were happy with the radically changed life they had chosen to be in for professional reasons, he said, “It’s not about if I’m happy or not. I’m
fulfilling my role in this job because that’s what I felt that I needed to do. I don’t see happiness the way you do and it isn’t my reason for doing things.”
I was crushed for him. If we don’t see life’s purpose as pursuing and steering towards happiness, then how else can one be meaningfully fulfilled?
Marie Kondo wrote an excellent piece, titled How to Choose Happiness, where she suggests that everything in your life should spark and bring you joy, from clothing to relationships, and if it doesn’t, it should be left aside. In this way, we can declutter our lives and minds from things that serve no productive value to our health and happiness.
While it is easy in today’s consumer capitalist culture to become wrongfully pulled into brief sparks, a purposeful life should be surrounded by intangibly real connections that don’t simply
spark joy but continually illuminate our souls. Real connections in love and in friendship should be trusted and nurtured.
During one of the eulogies, a friend spoke of the presence that her now deceased friend always offered to those around her. No matter who was in the room, she made you feel valued and her
eyes were on you alone. In today’s climate of hyperstimulation, this was a powerful reminder of the weight that the gift of your time can have on someone’s sense of worth.
Simple acts of kindness are what moves people. Appreciating and prioritizing one another fosters fulfillment.
While attending one of the wakes, a friend shared with me that he knew his friend was going to die but he didn’t want to call when he found out as they hadn’t been in touch for years. He
thought that it would be too obvious that he was only calling because of this inevitable fate.
No one ever knows what to say or what to do when facing death. There is no guidebook and no one envies someone who has had to become experienced in it. Like any difficult situation we
find ourselves in, as hard as it can be in the moment, the best thing to do is to be honest.
Don’t wait to tell someone how much you love them for fear of rejection; don’t not say how you feel for you’re unsure how it will be received; don’t avoid calling for worry your intentions may be questioned. Living a purposeful life sometimes forces us to act in less than comfortable ways, but when we do, that feeling of no regret bridges peace.
Watching my father, who is my heart’s understanding of what it means to live a fulfilled life, grieve the loss of his two dear friends in a short amount of time, reminded me of the importance
of simplicity in life.
My father embodies the values and morals of a purposeful life. He places his family first. He is present for his friends. He cherishes, and always tries to be better for, his wife. He loves living,
and works to keep his body healthy. He is kind, and he cares about connections, not things. He gives his gift of life to so many, and because of this, so many have come to rely on him.
This death of his friends was difficult not only for their loss, but for the role he played in supporting and organizing the details when he too was suffering.
He wrote to my sisters and me an email just before Easter, telling us how being someone who so many turned to is an honor, but also a challenge as he now finds himself at the top of a pyramid. He was so looking forward to having us all home so that we could provide a source of strength to him.
I was reminded that as much as we have all come to rely on him for so many things, so too had he come to rely on us. The circle of strength offered to those dear to us is a reminder of the
purpose of care we can all offer to one another. No person is without need of the warmth of another, and we are only weak if we deny ourselves it.
The purpose of life is only as much of a mystery as we allow it to be. Choose happiness. Seek sustained joy. Offer warmth and appreciation. When we continue to live to fulfill and bring
happiness to others, bridges are connected, reciprocity flows and the mystery is easily solved.
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Ashley Yvette enjoys traveling, exercise and reading. Continually growing and learning from many experiences and relationships has encouraged her to begin to share and add her dialogue to the conversation. The more voices contributing to this complex social myriad, the better equipped she believes we are to foster a genuine and deeper understanding, appreciation and empathy towards one another.
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