Like I Talked To a Wise Dead Man About Life (Not For Those Running Away From Reality)
The Perspective of a Dying Man On Living a Worthwhile Life (“Tuesdays With Morrie”)
“Tuesdays With Morrie”, by Mitch Albom, is one of the many books that gave me goosebumps.
But amongst the few that made my eyes fill with tears of revelation.
A true story about a dying professor, Morrie Schwartz, and his old student, Mitch Albom, and their brief conversation over a life well lived.
The following article is written in a question-and-answer form.
The questions that come to our mind every now and then, and the simple answers that Morrie had for them.
Hope you learn something valuable.
How do we live a meaningful life?
The simple way to a meaningful life is to love each other, do something for the community and create valuable things for society that give us purpose.
Why is it the most important thing in life to give love to others while also letting it inside?
Often times we are too afraid to love because we feel that we might lose it or we don’t let the love inside because we think that it will make us too weak and vulnerable in this harsh world.
But doing this, we just miss the point completely. Love is the solution to all this. It is the only rational act towards a beautiful life.
Love is how you live even after you are gone.
Should we feel sorry for ourselves?
There is no running away from emotions that our own mind begets. Doing so is a futile act and an invitation to fear and anxiety of the unknown.
But, giving it the acknowledgment and the observation it deserves is the way to overcome it. Running doesn’t help.
How do we overcome the fear of death?
Imagine a little bird sitting on your shoulder every day. Ask that bird, “Is this the day I die?”, “Am I ready?”, “Am I being the person I wanted to be?”, “Am I valuing the things that are actually important to me or lost in superficiality?”
Ask till the answer is a “yes”.
Once you get to a “yes”, then, that would signify that you spent your days giving to others. Your time. Your love. Your compassion. Your care.
That’s how you live through others. That’s how you overcome the fear of leaving one day.
Why does an encounter and acceptance of death make us more full of life?
Death is the ultimatum.
Once we truly accept it and stop deluding ourselves into believing that we are immortal, only then, do we start to see through the trivialities of life and focus on what actually matters to us.
We stop living someone else’s life. Because we realize that we only have one.
How do you detach from negative emotions and past experiences of life?
Instead of pushing away and trying to extirpate your emotions and feelings that bog you down, one should do the opposite.
Dive into them.
Only when you have fully experienced something, is when you understand what it truly is and how to create space from it.
Acting oblivious in fear of something won’t take you anywhere. Turn the faucet on.
What can bring true satisfaction to us?
Giving is the point. Your time. Your compassion. Your love. Your care.
That is what makes you feel satisfied and paradoxically important too. The race to materialism won’t take you anywhere. If you compete in titles, stuff, or money, then, unfortunately, someone will always be there above to show how inadequate and miserable you are. And also, someone below you to envy and despise you for your pompousness.
Ergo, instead, focus on the stuff that comes from your heart, and spread it copiously.
What is the importance of fully being in the present?
The present is the only time that you have.
If you are with someone, give them your full attention, like they are the center of your universe. Invest in your relationships because that’s the only way you live after dying.
Within the people you love, and who loved you.
What is the way to a happy romantic relationship?
You must have your values aligned. Without it, does not matter how much you love each other, you won’t stick around too long.
Mutual respect and the stomach to hear a “no” as well as say one, even with the potential of making the other person mad is important.
Talking about difficult topics to each other is key.
What choices should we keep to ourselves?
The contemporary world tries to define the status quo, almost invariably across all dimensions of your life.
It is your responsibility to not let it make you live someone else’s life. Make the big decisions yourself. Choose your own values and your own metrics.
Don’t let them decide that for you.
Why is forgiveness important?
It doesn’t pay you anything to hold grudges against people and yourself. It’s a brief life.
Forgive yourself for all the things that you hold yourself at fault for.
Then, forgive others. Try understanding them. Try seeing the world from their perspective.
You still have got a chance to do it. Do not squander it.
The Perfect Day Might Be a Really Average One
Well, that’s the whole point.
Morrie valued the small and little things most in his life. His daily rituals, his swims, his dance, and his relationships. He already knew what mattered to him the most and was long after it.
His imminent death made it even more clear and gave us the message that it’s time we stop deluding ourselves with the illusion of revelries of the modern world.
It’s time to stop valuing the trivial and being afraid of caring about what we value as important, even though the others might be antithetical.
Morrie’s Perspective
He saw it differently than us. Even though he used to mourn and cry about how awful life is to him in the mornings but he soon would separate from these feelings.
He rather chose to look at it as if life gave him the last chance to be able to pay the final goodbyes to the people he loved.
He believed he was lucky.
So are we, but, only if we choose to look it that way.
