Some life lessons from "The Undertaker Van"

During my daily commute to office, tend to view the “Undertaker” van parked across the road. Mumbai traffic amongst all other benefits (pun intended), also gives us enough room for expanded thinking and processing the deeper elements of our unutilized brains – Thought of sharing the conceived thoughts from this frequent visualization of the van, aloud.

Eventual destiny of entire humankind tends to be Death: A though much feared, revered, questioned, but, amongst all, an unexpected phenomenon. Implies that, our versatile mind tends to project death as a much distant reality for ourselves, and, something that only occurs to others.

Let’s face it. The timeline and methodology of this factuality, tends to be unpredictable, and, some key queries which should occur continuously:

• Have we lived enough? (Our own self)
• Have we loved enough? (Family, Friends, Surroundings, Society)
• Have we aspired and achieved enough? (Career, Ambitions, Goal)

Nature by design has made the predictability of death so distant, and, unprecedented, for a reason. We can either, make use of the reason for shaping, or, breaking ourselves.

Majorly, there can be two extremes to the question “What happens if today is your last day in this world” – One extreme is Hedonism, and, the other asceticism, wherein, one philosophy propagates indulgence in severe material pleasures, and, the other one, severe penance – both of which are futile in current times, with, an individual having to support his worldly expense.

There is also a ‘Middle Way’, and, mind it, ‘middle’ does not imply mediocre in this case. The base definition of Middle way tends to be living for a cause, to propagate a joyous state for ourselves and others. (We are not entirely focusing on the middle way in this article, considering the humongous span of the subject, and, interested readers can try to look up the concept : “Nagarjuna's Middle Way: Mulamadhyamakakarika”)

Our focus here is on the other part of the spectrum, with a broader question – When our life span is so unpredictable, do we justify our beings (our own selves) with “Mediocre” thinking.

Are we not limiting our potential somewhere, with a sole concentration on how to survive life, rather than, how to live life? Are we surviving our lives till death takes a toll, or, creating value for ourselves and the people whom we interface with? These are certain core questions for us to ponder, to utilize our balance lives to the fullest possible, thereby creating value.

Why cant we strive for the dream role which we aspired when we knew how to dream? What prevents us from aspiring the highest level available for our core operating paradigm? Do we procrastinate vacations with our families / friends waiting for the right time – Is there a right time? Are we too thoughtful on taking risks – Fearing the worst each time? How many times have we missed on life for fear of failing or our inability to take adequate risks?

Many of these paradigms will vanish, or, be extremely clear, if we retain the “Undertaker Van” in our thoughts. Off course, the humble author doesn’t have answers himself, and, is in search continuously, but, visualizing the “Undertaker Van” frequently in transit, tends to be an appendage thinking and guidance on how to wholly utilize our beings till the very end.