Source: Joseph Argus/Wikimedia Commons
One of the beautiful things about being young is the sense of infinite potential and possibilities. Life stretches before us like a great unknown, a white canvas on which we hope to paint the vibrant colors of our lives. We don’t usually know what that picture will look like, but we hope it will be special.
For some of us, the fantasies may go in the direction of becoming rich or famous or well-known in a particular field. For others, the vision is more domestic and inward, focusing on security and relational harmony. Whatever the particulars of our youthful dreams, I think at their core, they reflect our innate striving to tap into and express the infinite nature of our soul, the hope that we can express our uniqueness in the world.
A lot can happen between those early dreams and the actual finish line. As some of us approach the end of the course, we look back on the major decisions made—the marriage(s), the career(s), and the children or the decision not to have children. We look back on our mistakes and failures, the times we went astray, the paths not taken. And we try to appreciate the successes and the times we got it right.
With all of this, I think an overriding truth that must be come to terms with is that we will run out of time before we run out of desires. That is, we have to come to face the reality that we cannot possibly do all the things we once assumed we would find time for, whether it’s learning another language, the bongo drums, traveling to every country in the world, or writing the great American novel. Just as there are far more seeds spread than actually sprout, we have far more ideas and impulses for how we hope to express ourselves than we will ever be able to manifest.
Written like this, it seems, “Well, of course, there isn’t enough time to do everything. Isn’t that our daily experience as well?” Yes, but when we run out of time at the end of the day without ever completing our list, we always think there’s tomorrow. When we run out of time toward the end of our lives, we have to come to terms with how few tomorrows remain and recognize the stark truth that we simply can’t be everything, can’t have everything, won’t taste everything that life has to offer. It’s a sobering, humbling truth that is difficult but necessary to swallow.
What can be the purpose of having to accept this difficult truth? If we locate this need for stark humility in our later years in the overall arc of our development, can we discern an upside to this otherwise uncomfortable truth?
I imagine everyone needs to find their own meaning, but I’ll share that which is forming for me as I approach the finish line: the ruthless truth of approaching death enforces a mental discipline that was always possible but not previously required. The truth is this: We’re not that important. We are not actually the center of the universe around which all else orbits. We are going to die, and the world will continue without us.
Much of what we once imagined to be of ultimate importance was not. Whether we speak multiple languages or fill our passports with foreign travel matters—if at all—at the micro level, not the macro level. Accepting this truth can free us up to be more present to what is, not what we wish for. There’s something relaxing in letting go of the heroic struggle to be something more than what we already are, in wishing for things to be other than they actually are, in living in an imagined future rather than the fullness of what is.
I used to get annoyed with retired people who would have all the time in the world to talk to me, and I’d have to peel myself away from them to get on with my busy life. Now that I have more discretionary time, I see they were on to something. We may not have time to do or to be everything, but we actually have all the time in the world to be right here, right now.
