One Life, Old Man

Matthew Gates http://notetoservices.com 5m 1,360 #onelife

The views of this article are the perspective of the author and may not be reflective of Confessions of the Professions.

Each day is a blessing in disguise. Our lives pass before our eyes in the blink of an eye. Life seems like a long existence to a human being, but to the universe, it hardly registers on any measurable scale to a 15 billion year old. Every person has a life full of history, full of lessons, full of experience, and may even have a life full of regrets. Regardless, life comes with its challenges and everyone has to live the life they want to live. The way a person lives depends on what kind of family they were born into and the lifestyle they develop. Almost everyone has the choice to change their situation.

Whenever in the moment, life tends to pass a little slower just so you can enjoy the moment a little bit more. The innocence and the open book of the world in childhood makes the day go slower. A child experiences the world differently than an adult. All experiences, when they are not routine, are new and exciting. It is those moments we remember most. Once they become routine or unexciting, they tend to pass faster. The childhood you experience often plays a large role in who you become. Whether you use your past to define your future is up to you, but you do not have to let it define who you are.

High school seems to take forever but once it is over, you are left wondering where the years went. In the moment of taking classes, staying up all night to study, and getting through exams in college seems as if it will never end till one day, you are no longer in school, and your life becomes about finding a job, working, making a paycheck and getting some money, paying bills, with a few fun activities in between. The unfortunate thing is, when people tell you to enjoy those years, you never truly understand what it means until those years are gone. You make of it what you will when you go through it. You might string along, doing nothing, and just hoping its over, or you might as well enjoy it, and create lasting memories and friends.

Life is tough, full of challenges, and hardships. You will meet new people, make new friends, establish strong relationships, lose touch with old friends, keep in touch with best friends, and eventually you will come to bury loved
ones, especially face the reality that you will bury your parents. You will face many problems, find many solutions, have many jobs, love a few of those jobs, hate more of them. You will grow, acquire new knowledge, and become wise. You will spread this knowledge, only to realize that no one wants to listen, because everyone must experience life for themselves in order to grasp their own wisdom. You will find love, lose love, and find it again. During your lifetime, you will come to understand that there are many types of love.  You will long for love, hope for it, and eventually receive the love you need.  You will have your heart broken.  You will learn to heal your broken heart. You will not always get what you want, but you will find that you will get what you need.

During these years and beyond, you may discover another significant individual who may capture your eye. They may have some things in common with you, they may be attractive, and you work up the courage to give this person a chance, they give you a chance, and although the universe seems to be conspiring against you, as past relationships have not worked out, this one particular relationship seems to click. You and that individual get along so well and you fall in love with each other. Everything is going great and you have children.

Before you know it, you are in a hospital watching a child that you made with your significant other being born. You hold the child in your arms, wondering how you got here, how you made it this far in life, and you see the future of everything that is going to happen to this child happen before your eyes. You know you want an equal or better future for this child. This child means everything to you. It is your creation, your blood, your offspring, the representation of what is to exist in the future, long after you are gone. You watch this child grow up, becoming stronger and smarter with each passing day, till one day, they start to want their own independence, headed to high school, learning how to drive, and getting a job. Graduation of high school comes and they then inform you they are headed off to college, where you get a glimpse before your eyes, of them as a child, with you holding your child in your hands.

They are grown up, meeting people, developing relationships, and eventually meeting their significant other. All this happens while you are working, trying to make you and your family’s life better. They leave the house for now and possibly for good, establishing their own life, working, marrying, and having a family of their own. Your life feels complete. You still have life to live, to enjoy the company of your children’s children, your grandchildren.

Finally, you understand your purpose in life. You feel as if you have served a great purpose in life. Everything up until this moment all happened for a reason. You feel as if your life is complete. You have done all you can and life has been generally good to you. You have lived the best way you know how to live. You accept your fate, the good and the bad, and everything becomes clear to you. You get one life to live, make the best of it, for it may be all you get to live.

Before you know it, you are older, your children are grown, you may have grandchildren or great grandchildren, and your life is almost over. You may or may not be ready. Eventually, you must accept that this is the cycle of life and death is a part of life.

You are ready to go. Ready to return home. Life has been wonderful. Life is wonderful. In the end, when life flashes before your eyes, you will completely know that everything that happened was exactly the way it was supposed to happen. You were not a body with a soul, but a soul with a body, a soul experiencing the world with the body as your tool. Your body was great to your soul. It remained strong in those times when your soul was weak, and your soul remained strong when your body was weak. Your body and soul needed each other and helped each other through life. You will come to the sudden realization that the universe may be large, complicated, and beyond human comprehension, but you will understand that the universe has a mysterious power that bended for you, to make your life what it is and what it was. And in your final moments, as your soul leaves your body and says goodbye, your body may die, but your soul will live on.

*Photos Courtesy of Internet and Pixar

Written in memory of my dear friend, Wayne Michael McGinness.

(