Love, Loss & putting your house in order

A few days ago, we lost, as a family, someone so dear to us. She had accepted us into her family and we had come to enjoy the privilege of her love. But the day came, and she rested. And as it is with most grief experiences, the period of preparing for her final resting was filled with reflections, prayer, sweet memories, and the number 1 question we often ask ourselves during such a time: what will I be remembered for?

About 7 years ago, I (together with some friends) had the task of writing our eulogies. The point of the exercise was to help us discuss death but more importantly, re-assess how we want to be remembered and therefore, how we should live. We had to write down the eulogy/tribute from three perspectives:

1. What the person closest to you would say: spouse/partner/best friend/parent/sibling
2. What the person dependent on you would say: kids/employees/co-founder
3. What the silent but present people in your life would say: employees, nanny

Reading this, you might assume that this assignment was an easy one to do. It was not. As people, we might like to lie to ourselves when daydreaming and talking to friends, but there's something about putting pen-to-paper that forced us to contend with the truths about our own lives. At the end of the exercise, you got to read your eulogy out loud, and together, share what was hard to read and hard to accept, and what you were glad to see. Even then, the reality of my own mortality had me balling like a baby, but it helped me learn several things about myself.

I learned that how I wanted to be remembered conflicted in some ways with how I spent my time. I also learned that <at that time> I cared very little for people I spent a lot of my time with, and cared a lot for people I spent too little time with. Finally, that I have dependents who need me to put my house in order and make the transition process less administrative.

That experience changed me and my household. My husband and I started to document a lot more, and I also started the journey toward better prioritizing my time on what mattered more to me. It is also one of the main reasons I write, to help my kids get a glimpse of my thoughts; a chance to look in, even after I'm gone.

It's changed my perspective on work. I realized it was not ideal, could not be ideal, to spend 60% of my time in the office, yet care so little for those I spent the most time with and care so little for the work I spent my time on. I wasn't defrauding my company. I was robbing myself of the time I have left on this earth to really pour myself into the joys of being alive.

I wish this was a happier LinkedIn post, but the past 8 months have been tough, I'm not sure whether it's that death has shown up at our door and moved in, or that death was always around and we're the ones who never noticed it sitting there; with things to say but no-one to say them to.

I've found myself battling with the reality that the more we love, and the more we age; the more familiar death will become.

But the response cannot be fear. I don't want to fear. I'm alive today. I have breathe in my lungs. And so I will lean in, love more, hope more, and have faith.

"...But the greatest of these is love."

<3 CucuNgong