The great motivator
I was driving through Alabama on my way to Florida and I saw these beautiful old farm buildings. They were starting to decay and fall apart. It reminded me of that greatest of all paradoxes; the notion that “all things fall apart”
As human beings, we are faced with the knowledge that all the things we do, all the projects we work on, everything we produce, all of our friendships, our family, all of our hard work… it will eventually turn back into dust.
We too shall die.
Frightening, for sure. But this is a necessary thing. Not just because it happens to 100% of us. But because mortality forces us to act. To seize this moment. To live this life. The one that we’ve been given. To savor. To enjoy. To maximize. To fill with potential. To be fully human.
As I drove by those old farm buildings I was keenly aware of all the hard work, all the man hours, all the good times and hard times spent doing human things under each roof. I am sure that the men whose blood and sweat went into those buildings were not conceiving of the day when those buildings would rot away. Just like a mother does not imagine the day that her newborn child will be buried in the ground.
And yet this is our lot. This is what we do. This is what we are made for. And so we do it. Eagerly.
