Don't Burn the Day

“When you face death, it’s like facing a wall, and it forces you to turn around and look at the life you’ve lived … The prevailing mythology is that you die the way you live and you can't change yourself in any way. The fact is that the last few months of life — because of the awareness of death — create an urgency that facilitates growth and change.”  William Breitbart, a psychiatrist at Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.  (from an NPR broadcast).

I have become a person who listens to NPR on the way towork.  I’m not sure when the change from jamming to some DMB to tuning into talk radio in the morning occurred, but I have found that after 30, things like this just happen, so I roll with them.   I still jam to music on the way home from work because I refuse to completely give myself over to the dark side as a grown-up who loses touch with the magic of music.  (My current obsessions are Adele’s 21 and Ray Lamontagne’s God Willing and the Creek Don’t Rise if anyone is looking for some new tunes).  None of this speaks to my point (except the listening to NPR part) so I’ll get on with it.

During my Monday morning drive, NPR was airing a story about dignity therapy titled, “For the Dying, a Chance to Rewrite Life.”  A psychiatrist was discussing his years of research and practice of allowing dying patients to come to terms with death by essentially writing the history of their life to pass on to whomever they choose.  It was intriguing to hear about how people reinterpreted events while facing death.  He explained that people feel the need to assert themselves in the face of death, to be seen in a way of their choosing.  Essentially (though not surprisingly), facing death changed perspective and priorities.  Thus, the quote I began this post with. 

What struck me so much about the segment was that I realized that probably the reason I live such a full (and sometimes mentally exhausting) life – ever changing, growing, turning directions if something isn’t working or if I don’t feel happy– is because I make decisions and live life as if facing death every day.  Because… we are.  I know some people could construe this as depressing, but I think most people who know me would say that I am anything but a depressed person.  It’s just that, I have this one chance to build my life, and as touching as these stories were, I don’t want to wait until I reach my death bed to grow and change.  I don’t want to have a regret or memory that I feel the need to reinterpret.  It might be the only time when, as a writer and writing teacher, I would call “rewriting” a dirty word.  I want to face death and think, “Now that was one hell of a life, and I wouldn’t change a thing.”  It may mean I change my mind a lot and over-analyze how I feel about situations, but I can accept that. 

Not knowing when I’ll face my actual death bed forces me to make every day a good day to die.  And for me, there’s just no other way to live.