Living eulogy

​Almost two months ago I wrote about the effects of my Dad’s medical scare and the resulting confrontation with not only my own mortality, but the mortality of those dearest to me.

The cliché phrase of “live today like it’s your last day” isn’t effective. It doesn’t ignite the sense of urgency people need to truly live their lives with meaning and purpose. And that’s because people have a really difficult time grasping the inevitability of their own mortality.

What I propose instead is to live and love as though it was your best friend’s last day. Your Dad’s last day. Your Mum’s last day. Or any of your sibling’s last day. When you think about the ultimate demise of those dearest to you, it changes your perspective. It fills you with a sense of sadness, a sense of urgency, and almost a sense of regret.

What if today was their last day? Would they know how much they’ve meant to you? How much they’ve impacted you? How much you look up to them? If the answer to any of those questions is no, what are you doing? Why haven’t you communicated this to them? Why wait until it’s too late - why wait until their “body is in a box” before you celebrate their existence?

When we think of a eulogy, we think of funerals. But what if we changed that? What if instead, we created living eulogies? What if we dedicated our lives to constantly communicating to those around us just how important they are? How much richer would not only their lives be, but ours too?

How can you adopt a living eulogy into your life?

WEIGHT LOSS

in 18 months, i lost 10kgs. my secret? i didn’t intend to.

i always have mixed feelings about goal setting because when we set goals, we’re setting them from a position of deficiency. from a place of lacking. we’re here, but we want to be there. and so we concern ourselves with getting “there”.

the problem with this mentality is the energy it elicits. it’s negative. it’s deficient. it’s stressful. and as i mentioned in a former post about my weight, stress makes you retain weight, not lose it.

the problem with diets is they deal with the “how” and the “what” but they neglect to tackle the “why”. people know what they should be eating, people know they should be exercising, so why don’t they? it’s not from a lack of knowledge, it’s from a lack of understanding. understanding their “why”.

so the question i would ask anyone wanting to lose weight - when did you first notice you put on weight? what was going on in your life that might’ve contributed to the weight gain? and what are you emotionally holding on to that you can’t seem to let go of?

for me, it was soccer. it was the idea of “making it”. soccer consumed every thought. every decision. every ounce of my energy. and it was stressful. debilitating. limiting. once i let that go, i started listening to my body. i started paying attention to when i was actually hungry, not when i “thought” i should be eating. i questioned, “do i really want this?” and if the answer was yes, i’d eat it. if no, i wouldn’t.

i’m not trying to minimise weight loss, but i am trying to reduce the stress surrounding it. fancy diets don’t work, not because they’re fancy, but because they don’t deal with the root cause. answer the aforementioned questions and start listening to your body. start relieving your stress and i’m pretty confident the weight will start relieving you.

"STICKS AND STONES...

may break my bones but words will never hurt me.”

whoever came up with this phrase has obviously never truly lived. because reality is, words do hurt. and they hurt a lot.

something i really struggle with is mean people. people who say mean things with the specific intention of causing pain to others. i wholeheartedly understand hurt people hurt others, and their words are merely a projection of their inner pain, but that awareness doesn’t prevent you from internalising the sting in those words.

as my aunt said, someone can chop off your arm and be extremely apologetic for chopping off your arm, but at the end of the day, now you have no arm. words are no different. someone can lash out at you and be extremely apologetic, but the damage has already been done. those words, that energy, it exists in the universe now. and it’s an energy that isn’t serving, it’s an energy that is destructive.

just because you’re hurting, that doesn’t excuse you for hurting others. because within that hurt, you’re causing more hurt. words can be scarring. so next time you feel like giving a tongue lashing, stop. breathe. and ask yourself if what you’re about to say is helpful or harmful. use your words to serve, not destroy. choose words that heal, not harm. and remember, that other person? they’re a human too.