Death feels final but its not.
I was at a cremation for the beloved father of a close friend.
Memories and bittersweet stories were shared – the mischief, the shenanigans, the romance, the love, the pain, the loss.
They talked about the passion he had for his craft, the deep love he had for his family, and the kindness he had for the people around him.
A young cousin of mine have had several setbacks, personal and professional.
He feels like a failure. A loser in life.
A millennial weighed down by so many expectations:
- To follow his passion.
- To be fit and healthy. All day every day.
- To be successful by working ‘smarter’, not ‘harder’. Whatever that means.
- To be better than average, which is synonymous with mediocre, and thus, a failure.
- To know that the beautiful and successful images projected on social media is not real, and yet feel inadequate for not measuring up to these impossible and fake ideals.
No one has a manual on how to navigate life. There are lots of books, but many are contradictory.
Let’s get back to basics, articulated beautifully by Obama and Brene Brown:
#BeKind
#BeBrave
#BeUseful
And when you leave the human race at the finishing line, you’ll have a legacy in those whose lives you’ve touched.
That’s a life worth living.