Too Soon Gone

I got word of two deaths this weekend.  One was a Great-Grandmother that had lived a long and full life and the other was a young father just starting to live his.  One lost a long battle with cancer, the other died in a hunting accident.

In both cases, the message that was brought home to me is that no matter how long or how short our time on earth is, whenever that time is up, it’s always too soon.

One of my friends is a firefighter and he was telling me of an accident scene that he had responded to that morning very near my house.  Firefighters are frequently called out to car accidents in my city to either help extract the occupants from the tangled metal car frames or to prevent any leaking gasoline from igniting.

He described a scene in which a car with two young women had pulled out of an intersection only to be “T-Boned” by another car that had run a red light and was traveling at a high rate of speed.  The two women were killed instantly.

Knowing the exact intersection he was talking about, I made it a point to stop there on my way home from work that same afternoon.  I paused and purposely tried to make myself open and receptive to whatever might come up.  Know what the first thing I felt was?

Now, before I go on, let me emphasize that I am not “paranormal” or “psychic” or anything like that, and no, I don’t own a Ouija Board.  Heck, I can’t even watch “Ghost Whisperer” on TV without rolling my eyes.  However, I do believe that some type of energy animates our bodies and that when we die, that energy is not destroyed.  Some people call that “energy” a soul.  Regardless, there is some part of us that lives on and sometimes that “essence” or “energy” lingers for a while.

The first thing I felt when I paused at the corner where those two women had been killed was a deep felling of regret.  It was a regret of all the things they had planned to do but that now would never happen.  Regret of all the things that they really wanted to tell people but that now would be left unsaid.  Regret that their time on earth was too soon gone.

No, it wasn’t anything  “spooky” nor did I get a cold, clammy feeling down the back of my neck.  It was just an overwhelming feeling of regret.  I’m sure that if anyone had paused at that corner for just a second, they would have felt it too.

The lessons from all of this should be pretty plain:

• First, none of us live forever. Our time on this earth is limited.  This fact is not something to be denied or ignored.  Actually, it should be embraced – and used to spur us on to accomplish those things we always dreamed of.
• Second, live your life so there are no regrets at the end of it. That means doing the things you want to do TODAY instead of constantly putting them off.  That means telling people how you really feel about them TODAY instead of waiting for “just the right moment.”  It means having your “affairs in order,” all of them – physical ones, emotional ones, relationships, and religious ones.  That means saying “I’m sorry” as well as “I love you.”
• Appreciate the moment. There is nothing else.  You can’t relive yesterday.  You can’t live tomorrow.  You can only experience life today, right now, in this exact moment.  Make the most of it.

None of us know when our time here will be over.  All we know for sure is that it will be over.  Use that knowledge to motivate you to live each day to the fullest.  In the words of Tim McGraw, learn to “live like you were dyin’.”

Hiram
Certified Fitness Nutrition Coach and
Personal Fitness Trainer (NESTA)

Technorati Tags: funeral, death, regret, grief, life, motivation, accident

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