Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.
Steve Jobs’s quote. So true. There is one Korean saying that I think is an equivalent of it; If you accept death, you will live. If you try to live, however, you will die. In the face of death, one sees only the essence of life. We are born in the world, empty-handed after all. We’ve got nothing to lose. It’s not even easy to prove the existence of “I”, which we tend to take for granted all too easily. For a person who aspires to achieve his dreams and cannot help going to bed without thinking about it, fear, frustration, and failure are just a nuisance. The guy knows he must go on, until he reaches his last moment. He knows with intuition that it is the only way for him to feel alive. In this way he would have little regret, even if he dies tomorrow.
*Death is not the one that should be feared. It captures the essences of life and open up us possibility for us to truly live our lives.