grateful for life

People commend me for being so productive in my writing, speaking, and social media, even while running two factories. I could mumble something like vision or time management.

But the answer is simple: I’m old and dying.

Don't worry. I don't mean wrinkly, wizened old. And not wasting-away, wheelchair-bound dying.  I mean: I am not getting any younger. In due time, I will kick the bucket, buy the farm, push up daisies, join the choir invisible, pop one's clogs, ride the pale horse, take a dirt nap, enter into Glory. You get the idea.

Statistically, the average Filipino male has 67 years to live. For the average Filipino female, it’s 75 years. Go figure. This means that, in theory, I have nine more years before I am “no more". That's not even a decade!

There are two extreme reactions to impending mortality.

The first is cynicism. George Bernard Shaw once quipped that youth is wasted on the young.

But I adhere to the Christian paradigm. Tim Keller once said something like this: Heaven is a place where you can do all the good things you want to do on earth, but can’t.

Think about it. In our respective rooms at the Father’s mansion, the musician will still be composing arias, the artist will still be chiseling marble, the author will still be welding the pen.
But there will no longer be griping about lack of time.  In fact, will time still exist in eternity?

The words “potential” and “struggling” will be banished from our vocabulary; our skills and talents will find their fullest expression. Each output will be more splendid than the last.
Each masterpiece will attest to God’s unbridled radiance.

But meantime, I am here.

There’s a lot to wisdom to imbibe and to impart. Lots of experiences to pursue and to process, both real and virtual, the peaks as well as the valleys, the heartwarming and the heartbreaking.
Lots of old friends to greet, lots of new friends to meet.

I guess I am striving to make my deathbed as regret-free as possible. Blame it on Steven Covey’s funeral exercise, Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture, or Nelson Dy’s Final Interview.
Thus, I live, love, laugh, maybe lament a bit.  I scribble, speak, share.

So heck, yah. I will call this post:  Gratitude journal: Life