Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Life as a Present

Because someone we love is in Heaven ...
... there is a little bit of Heaven in our home. 
(Unknown)

How would you lead your life if you knew that you only have a few more months or years to live? Many of us have come across questions like this when a loved one faces this agony. However, it is hard for us to give a meaningful answer to these questions until we face death ourselves. 

When our loved one passes away, we often end up being so sad that we can't move our focus away from it and are completely oblivious to the needs of our family and friends at that time. Some are so hurt that they even want to give up on their own life. But then, the opposite emotion may hit us as well when we catch ourselves being happy again one fine day; shouldn't we feel guilty instead?

Would the loved one we lost really be happy if we lost out zeal of life afterwards? What would make our loved one really happy?  That we die after him, or that we lead a happy and meaningful life? When we focus on moving on with our life, we in fact honor our passed loved ones. When life flows through us, when we make people laugh and lively, we in fact know that our loved ones live through us. Our loved ones taught us a lesson so we are not going to waste our life just as they want us to. 

So what would you do if you know that you only have a few more years to live?  What do you think - we are going to live every moment of it! Isn’t this our mission while we are alive?  Live it and be thankful for every moment life gives you and make good use of it!  Connect and care for everyone who comes into our life. They will one day carry the light that we pass on to them. Tim McGraw's Live like you are Dying song perfectly captures this sentiment:

He said I was in my early forties, with a lot of life before me,
when a moment came that stopped me on a dime.
I spent most of the next days, looking at the x-rays,
talking about the options, talking about sweet time.
I asked him when it sank in that this might really be the end,
how's it hit 'cha when you get that kind of news? Man, what'd ya do?
And he said, I went skydiving, I went Rocky Mountain climbing,
I went two point seven seconds on a bull called Fu Man Chu.
And I loved sweeter, and spoke deeper and I gave forgiveness I'd been denying.
He said, I was finally the husband that most the time I wasn't
And became a friend, a friend would like to have.
And all of a sudden goin' fishin' wasn't such an imposition,
and I went three times that year I lost my dad.
Well, I finally read the good book and I took a good hard look
And what I'd do if I could do it all again.
Tim McGraw - Live like you are dying

By Christian and Su Zhen

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