Time is the big equalizer in this life.
It doesn’t matter how rich you are, or how beautiful or intelligent or strong, time will have its way with all of us.
It doesn’t matter what you do or who you are. This existence is temporary and that is what makes it special.
It isn’t often that we contemplate our own mortality. Death is feared, the young are celebrated, and the elderly are hidden away or pitied as we see that they are nearing the end of their journey here.
When you are young, you think it would be great to live forever. But when you think this way, you are also setting special conditions on what this eternal life would look like.
First, your body has to stay the same. You want to live forever but it has to be in a 25-year-old body.
Your friends and family have to stay too. There is no sense living forever if everyone around you is dying. You also have to maintain a certain standard of living, where you always have enough money to support your wonderful lifestyle.
The world can’t change either. You like things the way they are, with plenty of food and water and a climate that makes it easy for you to thrive.
Basically, you want to be frozen in time forevermore.
This is where we get attached to routines. We think that if we stay within the confines of a perceived sameness, a secure way of going about life, that we will be able to limit how much change occurs.
This not only doesn’t work, but it robs you of finding new joys in life and expressing yourself in different ways. Sticking to the same routine everyday is living the same moment over and over. It doesn’t freeze anything in time except for you.
There is nothing more real than change. You aren’t the little baby that you came into the world as, nor would you want to be. You aren’t the toddler, and certainly not the teenager. Be aware of one thing though – you will never be younger than you are right now.
We change, the world changes, everything changes. Time passes whether we are aware of it or not, and putting off the living of our lives for a future day when we will finally have everything we need to be happy is a futile waste of time.
There is no security. There are no guarantees. If you are alive this moment, then notice everything around you and appreciate it.
There will come a moment when your existence here will be finished.
Until that day it is important to live life well, to not waste time doing things that don’t matter. Turn the TV off, look around you and take care of what matters.
Own your own mortality. Own your own fragility. Acknowledge and embrace it.
It is because we live a temporary existence that this life is special. If we were here for eternity, then we could live life in any manner we chose. We would have forever to do better, to be the kind of person we came here to be.
But that isn’t the way it is. You are on the clock.
Appreciate everything you have and everything you are, and then strive to fulfill all of your wishes with a sense of joy and purpose.
There is no time like now.