I know the title sounds morbid and totally introspective. I swear though, it's not like a deep thought from Jack Handy - it's not going to squeak. (Props to you if you get that reference!)
So I was reading a chapter out of this amazing success book that I've been working my way through over the past couple of months. (Yes, months. It's heavy reading and requires some processing afterwards). The chapter started out kind of hard hitting and at first I was thinking it was saying something like, "Give up on making anything of yourself because no matter what you do you're going to die anyway, and no one is going to remember you regardless. You're not original, no idea you come up with it original, and at best you're mediocre." It LITERALLY says that everything we do is an exercise in futility.
Some success book, right? I was thinking that perhaps this was a chapter I ought to skip, but in the effort to continue growing my wisdom, knowledge, and understanding I read on.
"That which has been is that which will be, and that which has been done is that which will be done. So there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one might say, "See this, it is new"? Already it has existed for ages which were before us."
Dangit! Here I thought that I was some amazing inventor and wise beyond my years!
What's really funny is that my sister and I just had a great talk about this kind of stuff last week on one of our epic walk-a-paloozas. Though there are many innovations that happen, it is not likely that the innovator is the one who thought of it originally. It is likely someone else had the thought as well (and perhaps even a hundred years ago), but the innovator is the one who saw it through to fruition. Through their hard work and their persistence the idea was made into something real and tangible. It is only through effort that we will see that of which we dream.
Deep enough for you? It gets better.
The chapter goes on to discuss things like following the rules (oh horror of horrors for someone like me who thinks they were often meant to be broken) set forth by your leader - the one in authority. It tells us that there is a time and a place for everything - good and bad - and since no one knows what will happen, who can tell us when it will happen? So when the bad times come you can take comfort in the fact that good times will follow; thought sadly enough the opposite also holds true!
Furthermore, it is in the times of good that we are to be preparing for the bad times that are on the horizon. We are to be investing,saving, and storing up because we do not know what misfortune might happen on the Earth.
We are to work with excellence in diligence in whatever it is that we do, "for there is no activity or planning or knowledge or wisdom" after we die. And the bottom line is that we are supposed to work, we must not be idle and sit on our hands and assume that what we have sown is going to be successful.
Live your life and be happy in it, and remember even the bad times.
For all that I read in these passages, one thing truly stood out to me. I have been struggling recently with that pesky little thing called "EGO." You know, the thing that keeps you unteachable, that keeps you broke and prevents you from living the life you want to live. The one that tells you, "You're too good for this," or "You already know all about that," and even, "You're sooo much more capable than that person, so why did they get the promotion and not you?"
Yeah, you know that voice. I'm sure you do. I hate that voice!
Anyway, that voice, that little thing called EGO loves to keep us looking in the past. It keeps us looking back at what we did and what jobs we had and what those places are doing now, or who you used to date and who they're dating now.
Here's the hard-hitting truth (at least it was hard hitting to me):
Once you leave, someone else will be there to take your place.
Ouch. Yeah I know, that hurts. Don't they always say that the truth hurts? Yep, it hurts way deep down in those places that you're always trying to hide from other people. But the fact of the matter is that the above phrase IS the truth and it will happen whether it's you leaving a relationship, leaving a job, or leaving this Earth.
Oh Adrienne, you say outloud, talk about EGO. You're such a knowitall sometimes. Whatever!
That's ego too. You're right, I'm no expert. Who am I to talk about this stuff? I'm just a girl who is working through all of this now, at an age when I am ready to have my crap together and to get past all the stuff that is holding me back.
The bottom line is that we need to stop living in the past, and we need to not worry about the future. Why? Because we don't know what the future is! We don't know what is going to happen or where we're going to be, and we don't know when we're going to die or how. The only thing that we DO know is that we ARE going to die someday, and our life between now and then is all we've got so we had better make it GOOD. Once we're gone there's someone else there to take our place. to take our old things or to buy our old house. It's not ours anymore, it's someone else's and after that it will be for someone else.
"Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might; for there is no activity or planning or knowledge or wisdom in [death] where you are going."
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