Live Like You Were Dying

Recently I’ve been thinking about my life. Well, to be exact, I’ve been thinking of my lives. Both of them. First and Second. Lot’s of things have been happening in and around them that have both initiated and then fueled this period of self-examination. People have been talking about big changes to their First Life: going back to work, kids taking their first steps, big major life changing events that have a huge emotional impact on the person. Similarly, people have been talking about quitting their Second Life, or taking a long term break from it. Some have been getting married in it, or deciding that their partner isn’t really the one for them and have been splitting up. Again, huge, Second Life changing events…. Same huge emotional impact.

Maybe I’m, a bit of a stick in the mud, but these things are quite scary! To me it’s a big deal to give up something that has been a major part of your life for so long and similarly to commit yourself completely and utterly (well, as completely and utterly as you can in Second Life) to one person. It isn’t something you can just suddenly wake up one morning and “do”. You have to think about it. Consider the options. Evaluate potential outcomes. Break it all done into teensy ickle pieces and then obsess about them like some sort of deranged psychopath. Each and every negative must be prevented, whether it be by building emotional barriers or by simply kicking them to pieces. Literally.

Is this just me?

Does anyone else do this?

Can you make a snap decision and know with 100% of yourself that you’ve made the right one?

Even when it’s something I know that I want, I still have to know every single tiny thing that’s associated to it and how it could possibly impact in the larger scheme of things before I can actually make the commitment to do it. I may not be the most emotionally stable person out there, but I think I am reasonable sane. I know right from wrong and I usually know when I’m being rational and when I’m not. But this is different.

How do you make these big, life-changing decisions? Do you follow your heart and throw all worries to the wind? Do you write all the options on bits of paper and pick one out a hat? Are you like me?

I’ve reached a conclusion. It doesn’t tell me what to do. Doesn’t quell my fears or relieve my stresses. It doesn’t make my choices any easier or cushion any nasty side effects, but it does give me a great big shove in the right direction.

My gran used to say “you’re a long time dead” (well, to be honest it was more like “yir a lang time deid, hen, a laaaaang time deid” but you get the idea). So when I heard this song the other day, it struck a chord. A big, huge, shiny yellow one.





Tim McGraw - "Live Like You Were Dying"

He said I was in my early forties, with a lot of life before me
And one moment came that stopped me on a dime
I spent most of the next days, looking at the x-rays
Talking bout' the options and talking bout' sweet times.
I asked him when it sank in, that this might really be the real end
How's it hit 'cha when you get that kind of news?
Man what did ya do?
He said

I went skydiving
I went rocky mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denyin'
And he said some day I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dyin'

He said I was finally the husband, that most the time I wasn't
And I became a friend, a friend would like to have
And all of a sudden goin' fishin, wasn't such an imposition
And I went three times that year I lost my dad
Well I finally read the good book, and I took a good long hard look
At what I'd do if I could do it all again
And then

I went skydiving
I went rocky mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Shu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denyin'
And he said some day I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dyin'

Like tomorrow was the end
And ya got eternity to think about what to do with it
What should you do with it
What can I do with it
What would I do with it

I went rocky mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu
And man I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I watched an eagle as it was flyin'
And he said some day I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dyin'