Memento Mori

Last month I was challenged to run 100 miles with a friend, but by month's end we came up 4 miles short due to sickness. That sort of pictures most things I try--great starts and lousy finishes. At first I am disappointed when I come up short or fail but then I remember that sometimes I'm not supposed to finish. Failure becomes training ground. Like all those journeys and expeditions you read of where great explorers packed up their gear and left for months or years--some to die, some to fail, few to finish. That's the way it goes.

At least we tried. Had we not tried, we would never know what we could or could not do. There's always another chance to try again, as long as we live. That's how great things get done. By trying. But I am getting ahead of myself . . .

As December begins, one wonders how to begin a new month while also thinking about closing out another year.

This last year I've been reading The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday. Each month has a theme. When I saw this month's theme, at first I wondered why the editor did not chose a more uplifting subject. But when you think about it, there is no better subject on which to contemplate at the end of a year than death. That's how life ends, so why not a year?

“You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.”

What kind of thoughts are these? Dark, brooding, melancholic meditations? No. Thinking about death keeps one humble, for death is the great lever, for it happens to the strong and the weak, the rich and the poor--and somehow makes life much brighter, more sweeter. The Stoics call this practice, "Memento Mori," which is simply remembering the fact that you are going to die. I am going to die.   

For now, you are alive--so how do you live? That's the point. If you waste your life waiting for the end, then you've done just that--wasted your life. But if, knowing the end will come, you live and love with joyful intention, contributing to your world, then you die fulfilled. 

Have you tried? If you did not try, then you've not lived.