If I should get hit by a bus tomorrow, would I have regrets for things left undone? Would I feel cheated that I did not do something or experience something? My brain, now on the other side of 60 keeps giving me flashbacks of things I’ve done as well as things I wish I had done or done better or smarter. My 60 year old body has started to rebel and remind me that the 15 year old kid that used to live within…doesn’t live there anymore.
Do I have regrets? Yes, I guess I do, but then who doesn’t over a lifetime. Some things I did very well and others…not so much. I have regrets that I was not always honest with myself and others even though I put great stock in honesty. I regret that I did not try things in my career. If I had had the courage to follow my heart and my interests, I might have been an artist, an engineer or an archaeologist. I regret that I was not a better son, brother, husband and father. Looking back there are so many things I could have done better. I regret that I let fear guide so much of my path which allowed me to have the illusion of “safety,” but in reality denied me of so much of Life’s blessings, joys and adventure. I regret that I did not travel around and see more of the wonders of this world. I regret that I was not kinder and more compassionate to my fellow beings on this planet.
If my faith dictated that I had but one life to live and at the end of that life everything that I had done or left undone would sentence me to eternity in Heaven…or Hell, I might be a tad concerned. I’ve long since given up a belief in Heaven and Hell. It stopped making sense other than to scare the living into being “good.” The concept does not work for me. Why should we (our souls?) only be given a blink of an eye in all of Eternity to get things right? Based on one chance, one lifetime, we would spend the rest of Eternity floating on a cloud and walking down streets of gold or burning in torment forever and ever.
I’m reminded a lot these days that I’m no longer a young kid or even a young man in his prime, if indeed I ever was. I have diabetes. I have to watch what I eat. I have to force myself to exercise. I get tired and have to pace myself more and more. I have aches and pains that I constantly second guess. When you are 15, you think that you will live forever, but when you are 60, you begin to accept that life on this plane does not last forever. At 60 I can look forward to perhaps another 20 years, perhaps more, if I stay in reasonably good health. This life is finite and yet our essence (who we really are) is infinite. Our bodies and the life we lived will pass away. One hundred, two hundred, three hundred years from now who will remember our existence unless we were some great historical figure? What evidence will remain of what we held so dearly in this lifetime? There must be more to life than this one chance to get things right, this one chance to see and do it all.
I’ve come to believe that we get many chances, an infinite number of chances to get it right. We get many lifetimes. Each lifetime is a workshop, time and space to work things out. It never stops. Since we cannot go back and change the past and the future is always in the future, we therefore only exist in the here and…NOW. Each moment is a chance to do it better, get it right or to learn and grow. We have the “Power of Now” according to the New Age author, Eckhart Tolle.
I’ve also come to believe that we are all connected. We share a collective consciousness, a Oneness with Our Creator. Yes, I may no longer believe in Heaven or Hell, but I still believe in God. We are like the fingers of a giant hand, all connected, all with a purpose and yet seemingly independent at times. It is this vision of independence, of not being connected, of being an island in a sea of fingers that can lead some fingers to feel superior, more important than other fingers. That vision can allow for “us” and “them.” That illusion can allow war, genocide, poverty and discrimination. We miss the bigger picture of a hand, each finger with a purpose for being, grasping and together getting things done. God must surely feel sadness when our vision becomes so narrow, so focused on separation and thinking “what’s in it for me.”
I think after 60 years of life it is good to stop and reflect on things left undone. It is a good reminder of just how much more there is to do. May God bless this endless journey of life, learning and most definitely…discovery. And may we realize that all of this is just the beginning.
Food for THOUGHT…
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