As I've gotten older, I have come understand the sentiment behind it... it's really about being present, and not focusing on trivial things that could get between you and people that you love. It’s about being active, not indefinitely putting things off when you could be working toward them. But a few months ago on a night I couldn't sleep well, I suddenly came up with an improved version of this thought, and ironically, what I it turned out to be sounds like the exact opposite of the original:
Live like you're going to live forever.
It sounds silly on the surface, but let me walk you through it... contemplate how you would see life if you knew that you were going to live forever. Imagine that science has found a way to extend life, more specifically, *your* life. Healthwise, they can roll you back to approximately your physical prime, and that's how you'll be. A thousand years from now, you'll still be kicking around, not elderly and sick, but in general feeling pretty good. You've got all this time ahead of you, eon upon eon... now, what are you going to do with it?
Take your family, first of all. You're going to start seeing them from a unique vantage point. You'll see them and their lives for the flashes of glory, victors over adversity, and ultimate transcendence that all humans embody. We are ephemeral things, burning brightly and then gone, and you'll be reminded every day how precious the time you have with them is. With this in mind, I think you’ll spend that time much more thoughtfully.
Speaking of spending, I like to think that we’d all be a little more fiscally responsible, knowing that we have to live with the long-term ramifications of our financial decisions. I know, we don’t take it lightly now, but there are different things to consider about taking out a hefty loan when you’re eighty and when you’re thirty, right?
Something else you won't take for granted is the world around you. No longer will you be able to throw your plastic garbage in a landfill and not think about how long it's going to be sitting there, as endless tons more are heaped on top of it. The custodial care of the world will be more than just the next generations' problem, but yours personally, and you'll be sure to act like it.
Then there's the question of what you want to do with your life. Think about this: given enough time, what would you attempt to do? How many things are there that you just don't attempt because they're too involved, would take too long to begin, or you feel that you're too old to start? With the mindset of having an unlimited amount of life, you’d take even the most outrageous dream and set it into motion, even if it’s only the smallest of beginning steps.
From day to day, we tend to get caught up in short-term solutions. We pick the easiest route when it comes to work and relationships, sometimes without realizing when it becomes permanent. We turn around, and we find that years have gone by with no change, no growth. We’re not really to blame for this. Our world and society is constructed around a constant barrage of short-range questions: What’s going on *now*? What progress is being made *now*? Very rarely are we encouraged to think about anything other than what’s on the plate immediately in front of us. I heard someone say recently that in business, people are valued for traits that would be classified as OCD if they occurred outside the workplace. This disconnect makes it harder to balance our professional and personal lives than it needs to be.
Paradoxically, I find that constant appraisal just leads to lots of stuff being proposed and nothing concrete and long-standing being done. We’re more likely to come off better by proposing something new than by saying that we’re still working on an old idea, taking the time to execute it correctly. But, ideally, isn’t that the way it should be done? We should be perfecting and refining, instead of constantly turning over the soil to find something new and shiny. That’s the difference between finding spare change with a metal detector and digging a gold mine. If we were to live like we were going to live forever, we would find our rewards by focusing on the long game. Instead of the day-by-day accountability and flashiness of new ideas, we’d be much more likely to search for what really works and perfect it.
This translates to societies as well as individuals, where the potential rewards are even more pronounced. The Roman Empire built roads that are still in use today, two thousand years later. And how? By doing them right, putting down three feet of stone and rocks to make sure they endured. They really believed that their society would exist forever, and the fact that it didn’t is kind of moot. By acting as if it would, they gave us some of the most enduring architectural wonders and physical infrastructure the world has.
This is what happens when you act personally responsible for the future. The truly great ideas rise to the top, and the rest is left behind, without fooling us by looking fashionable or profitable in the short term. I think if we all stopped acting as if today were all we have – and there are people, including world leaders, who think that we’re literally in the End Times, a socially irresponsible position to hold – we’d set events in motion that might not benefit ourselves, or our children, but generations down the millennia.
