I spent some time thinking about death the other day. Not because I have any desire to die or anything, I'm well past that stage, but just because I was curious about how I would deal with it.
Would I want to know it was coming? Would I rather know nothing and have it be a surprise? If I knew it was coming, how would I handle it? Would I be strong? Afraid? Slip into deep depression? Could I accept it, deal with it, and move on?
I know that I'd much rather not know it was coming. To quote Red Dwarf, a “Mind that bus. What bus? Splat!” scenario. But if I did know it was coming, I'd like to think I could just accept and continue on. Laugh off the inevitability of it all, give it a shrug and a sigh, and go on about the last of my days. Enjoy the time that's left and not fret over how little of it remains.
Then I had a realization. I do know it's coming. I may not know when, but it is coming and nothing can stop it. Everyone dies, eventually. I've already had two near misses in my life, twice that I should have shuffled the mortal coil and didn't, so I'm on even more borrowed time than many.
So how am I using the “last of my days?” Am I wasting the time given to me? Am I doing what I can to be happy, and enjoy every day? What things do I really want to do that I'm always pushing off, to do “one of these days?”
So I've decided to try something.
Imagine that you've just been told you have but six months to live. 180 days from now, you will just drop dead on the spot. What would you do with those days? Make a list. Be realistic about it, only list things that you could reasonably do given your current resources. No “I'd buy a seat on a space shuttle flight and go into space” kinds of things. I don't know about you, but I don't have that kind of cash!
Once you've completed it, take that list and keep it. It's your to-do list. You don't have to do it in six months like you would if your days were numbered, decide on a realistic, but perhaps ambitious, time frame. Give yourself two years, five years, whatever you think it would take, again, being realistic about it.
Now, start crossing some things off that list!
When you're done, make a new list and start over.
(I haven't made my list just yet, I plan to sit down and work on that later today. I'll post it when it's done.)