How to die well.
We’re all going to die. There will be an end. We’ll breathe our last. Someone will say words. This is our future.? The problem is, this future is being written today.
We make choices in the present to make our future selves happy but we never become those people.? The happy people we’ll be are the people we are today.? We don’t have the awareness that we’ve become the people we dreamed about yesterday. But what does that mean?
We have to become good at living in tension.? We are responsible for the now and the not yet.? The life you want is dependent on the life you’re living.? The you you become is built on the you you are.? We like to imagine being something completely new by the end but that’s not real. This is a fantasy of impossibility. We love new construction but hate renovation. Even in death, you will still be the you you are.? What you will become is being determined today.
If we’re going to die, and we want to have lived a life that has earned the good words of death, we have to embrace the tension between today and tomorrow.? And like a taught cable across a raveen, we can then construct a bridge that will carry us well to our end. The anchors of this productive tension are self-reflection and intention.
Self-reflection requires an awareness of today.? Thoughts, feelings and behaviors are streaming in and out of our lives every moment we’re awake.? Are you aware of what they are?? Are you aware of what they’re trying to resolve? Are your thoughts, feelings and behaviors producing what you want them to? Do you know why you started them and do they feel like yours??
Self-reflection is also about tomorrow.? The trick of future self-reflection is that it can’t be divorced from the present.? If you are dreaming of a legacy that has no seeds in your current thoughts, feelings or behaviors, you’re not reflecting on your future, you’re indulging in fantasy. Self-reflection on your future, plays out the ripples and routines that will result from the life you’ve already built. Self-reflection is the great untapped power of transformation. But self-reflection without “action is a waste.”
The twin anchor of productive tension is intention. Research says that we make approximately 30-40,000 decisions a day.? How many can you we account for?? That means that many of our postures toward reality are running on auto-pilot. But just because their is an “auto-system” of some sort, it doesn’t mean you don’t have choice.? You can turn it on and off.? You can choose to feel the controls and response.? Too often we reach places in our life, not because we wanted to but we left the auto-pilot on too long and we forgot to change the pre-loaded destination.
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To override the auto settings is to take risk, but it also means ownership and clarity. It won’t change the circumstance around you. It likely won’t minimize pain and stress, but it will get you to place of your choosing. The tension of self-reflection and taking control with as much intention as we can, puts our life in our hands.
We’re all going to die.? Will the legacy of your life be one of your choosing or just the inevitable result of a rut you stepped into and forgot to step out of?
Begin to practice self-reflection and intention, you’re life won’t be perfect, but it will be yours.?
Mike D.
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Co-owner and Psychologist
2 年Beautifully written! Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this.