I have a news headline for you: We're all dead.
That's right officially, as of today, we are all deceased. In fact, truth be told we were dead yesterday, we were just as dead the day before and even before we were born, we were nothing more than a walking corpse, roaming the earth living on borrowed time and waiting for the day in which we finally stop breathing.
The funny thing is, as human beings we know this. From the day we're born we're raised with the knowledge that someday, somewhere we're going to die and that our time on this rock is simply borrowed. Whether we admit it or not, we all know that death is inevitable and we live our lives, every single day, knowing that it could easily be our last.
But this knowledge doesn't change a thing. Like bums dealing with a banker we seek to extend our loans and give ourselves just a little more time to carry on before death comes to collect us. Some of us choose to seek out good health, hoping that by eating right and exercising we can add a few paltry years to our existence. Big deal I say, you take a few years away from eternity and you're still left with eternity. You're going to be dead forever, what difference does five years make in the face of that?
Others of us try a different approach; they seek immortality through art, through literature and through helping others. They hope to live on in the minds and hearts of future generations and perhaps achieve some measure of immortality through their message and their actions. But even if these people create something so profound or something so incredible that it is passed from generation to generation flawlessly and completely, what happens when the inevitable day comes and all of the humans are gone and no one is left to carry the word any further.
Eternity remains, but the originator does not.
That's why life seems to be such a bitter and hopeless proposition for many. It's an existence, doomed from day one to fail and fall short of the Holy Grail known as immortality. We all will die, all of the banners we carry will some day fall to the earth and someday soon enough every last trace of who we were and what we did will be ground into dust.
To those who dwell on this, life truly is a miserable experience and I have great pity for those poor fools.
But they missed the point, when you go to the bank for a loan, you don't intend to make it last forever, you intend to use it. You know the house you buy will not last forever and that the car you want to purchase won't be around in a hundred years but you buy it anyway, you buy it happily and without regret. All you can do is make the most of your loan and then hope that what you do with it outlasts the money you spent.
Because while there's much to be said for extending our lives and it's extremely noble to seek to create something larger than ourselves, at some point you have to drop back from this foolish question and just enjoy what you have. It doesn't matter we're dead, we have the chance to be alive, let death collect me later, but give me the chance to do what I want in the here and now.
Because should my life amount to nothing more than a blip on the radar screen or a blink in the eye of eternity, then let it be said I lived it to it's fullest. I know that my life will eventually crumble into nothingness and while I would love to live on past my death in the minds and hearts of others, at some point, I have to remember to live. I have to remember that my time is extremely limited and that if I spend every waking moment dwelling on what I can never achieve I'm going to die all the same and be no wiser for the experience.
So with that my friends, lets all put down our pens and brushes for a moment and enjoy the fact that we have some borrowed time to work with. I assure you, we can change the world tomorrow because it will still be here the same as it will the next and the day after that.
Besides, if it's not, there's not much we can do to change it then anyway.
You are truly talented! I love reading everything you have to say and the way in which you say it! This all really hits home!
wow i never saw life like that but you've opened my eyes and now i see life in another perspective now. i like the way you look at life and be able to wright it all down. its a great.
I love this entry, what you say is so true, unfortunately i doubt most humans have the knowlage of this, or maybe they just refuse to accept it. either way, most are oblivious. I would love to read another entry you have wrote. Please E-mail me! ~Kate~