INSIGHTS DERIVED FROM TUEDAYS WITH MORRIE

When death occurs or a person is dying, perception toward life changes. Most tend to realize the important bits/areas/aspects of life.

The memoir, “Tuesdays With Morrie”, tells us the story of the Author’s, Mitch Albom, relationship with his college professor, Morrie Schwartz, who is suffering from a life-threatening disease. This memoir expresses the lessons given by his college professor which help him to understand and navigate some of life’s complexities.

Here are the lessons which resonated most to me;

1) Forgive Not Only Others But Also Yourself

An Excerpt “Forgive yourself before you die. Then forgive others. There is no point in keeping vengeance or stubbornness. These things I regret in my life. Pride. Vanity.

We also need to forgive ourselves. For all the things we didn’t do. All the things we should have done. You can’t get stuck on the regrets of what should have happened. That doesn’t help you when you get where I am. I always wished I had done more with my work, written more books. I used to beat myself up over it. Now I see that never did any good. Make peace. With yourself and with everyone around you.”

We do not realize how much we tend to look down on ourselves. Being our biggest critic for actions that we forgive in others in a heartbeat.

We remember things we have done in the past or things we failed to do/say and get just a little bit sadder. These emotions tend to stack up, holding us back from being entirely happy.

Yes, we may regret things from our past, but we need to learn to sit with our emotions, feel them, learn and let go. Not everything was and is withing our control, the past cannot be changed. Letting go gives our future a chance to thrive.

This is one thing I have struggled with as a person and as a Christian. Doing better is the answer I have found to moving on from my regrets; acknowledge the past, it has happened. But I owe my future to let it go.

2) Live Everyday As If It Is Your Last

We all know we are going to die but we pretend that we are going to live forever, living each day in denial.

An Excerpt “Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I the person I want to be?’”

Time waits for none of us whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. We often hear that we should do all the work we can now so when we are older we get to rest. The phrase ‘Make Hay While The Sun Shines’ is fresh in my mind. However, this memoir is telling us that making hay does not only apply to work but also applies to the limited opportunities we have to spend time with our family, to help people, and the chance to do what we love. We take this for granted more often than not as in our busy world, making bank is ever so important.

We believe we have more time everyday, but truly do not know when last we would say good bye.

My godfather recently passed. I believe it was a heart attack in the middle of the night as he was watching tv at night. If we ever thought about who might die soon, he at least had another 25 years to live. Everyone is once again reminded of the frailty of life. I always postponed putting a call through…I’d definitely see him next year.

We should strive to give our best now not waiting for that special time to express our love and kindness.

An Excerpt

“Everyone knows they’re going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently.”

So we kid ourselves about death, I said.

“Yes. but there’s a better approach. To know you’re going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time. That’s better That way you can actually be more involved in your life while you’re doing.”

How can you ever be prepared to die?

“Do what the Buddhists do. Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, ‘Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be? Is today the day I die?”

“Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.”

Why is it so hard to think about dying?

“Because most of us all walk around as if we’re sleep-walking We really don’t experience the world fully, because we’re half-asleep doing things we automatically think we have to do.” And facing death changes all that?

“Oh yes! You strip away all the stuff and you focus on the essentials. When you realize that you’re going to die, you see everything much differently.

Well, the truth is, if you accept that you can die at any time—then you might not be as ambitious as you are. The things you spend so much time on—all this work you do—might not seem as important.”

3) LOVE WINS

An Excerpt “One afternoon, I’m complaining about the confusion of my age, what is expected of us versus what I want for myself.

“Have I told you about the tension of opposites?” he says. “Life is a series of pulls back & forth. You want to do one thing, but you are bound to do something else. Something hurts you, yet you know it shouldn’t. You take certain things for granted, even when you know you should never take anything for granted. A tension of opposites, like a pull on a rubber band. And most of us live somewhere in the middle.”

Sounds like a wrestling match, I say. “A wrestling match,” he laughs. “Yes, you could describe life that way.” So which side wins, I ask?

He smiles at me, the crinkled eyes, the crooked teeth. “Love wins. Love always wins.”

Love always wins; be it slow and steady or fast and ready. Most of us are here because of love, either our parents loved us before we were born, or our mother’s loved us enough to keep us, or our adoptive family loved us enough to want us…an endless list of possibilities with the ultimate being God loved us enough to keep us, to give us a support system to cope with what life throws at us.

Love wins

With me in my life, I realize constantly the importance of being surrounded by the people we love and who love us, who have compassion for us. Human life cannot be lived in isolation. It cannot be lived without acts of kindness being extended towards us and vice versa.

The human nature is complex but built on so many ideologies, beliefs, notes of importance. But when we truly reflect and we realize that so many things that make up our reactions, thinking, beliefs, emotions are not necessary as they are from a place of pride/ego. Why wait to be at death’s door to realize what is important?