There are two realities about life which I fully understand, especially at my age. The first is Ben Franklin’s comment about dying. “Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75.” Living life is radically different than merely existing. Vegetating isn’t the same as living. We need to become involved in life rather than merely staying alive. The first reality is that our lives are finite. Unless we grasp this first truth, we won’t address the second finding.

Remember about the brevity of life. Now, we can move to the next truth. Living involves your learning and discovery about what is critical and important for you and the world. I think living life is about reaching one’s potential. There is far more than being lemmings in life. We need to define what our purpose in life is. You define it. Don’t allow someone else to determine it. What meaningful purpose should your life address? We have the gift of life; we need to seize that opportunity before it is too late. Think about what is critically important to you, your family, and the rest of the world. Then get engaged to help provide those necessities.

We all are aware, at one level, that our time isn’t infinite here on Earth. However, do the dance with death once or twice and that truth is seen from an entirely different perspective. While I am warning you of this, unless you have done the dance, you won’t fully grasp it. I didn’t, which was prior to a traumatic brain injury and metastasized cancer of my prostate. However, it does now since those two dances.

If you haven’t done the dance…yet, trust me. It has the potential, if you seize upon it, to change your life. Carpe diem. When you grasp the reality that you won’t live forever, it will motivate you. I have written many articles about other dancers: Randy Pausch, Steve Jobs, Miguel Cervantes, Kurt Vonnegut, Oliver Sachs, John Donne, Alan Seeger, John Kennedy, Steve Biko, Carl Sagan, Abraham Lincoln, David Hume, Saul Alinsky, Henry David Thoreau, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Alexander the Great. Tom Brokaw is the last dancer about whom I am aware.

I recently returned from Burma/Myanmar. I had a purpose. I wanted to visit my family.

Burmese independence flag

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Connecting the Dots

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Dancing with Death

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The Last Lecture

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02/12/18