Six Months to Live

Through my interviews and research for my new book project, I'm often confronted with people who, God knows, don't have all that long to live. And today, while jogging, I suddenly asked myself: "What would you do if you only had six months left?"

 

The five regrets of the dying

 

We are in charge what's around the corner

 

Why you want to grow old in the first place?

 

You born - live a life - you die. That's the circle. The average time counted in years is about 85 in western societies nowadays. In days that means 31000 days (yes, one day of it is over soon). But what does it mean for longevity? How does it matter if you extend this time by five years? 25 years?

What I want to say is, live NOW!

What will your lifespan be like?

 

At present we look at a lifespan of about 70-90 years, if someone is lucky to get there and depending on personal living situation, genetics, location, life circumstances etc.

If we pick the good case you become 80 years old, you have lived 29,200 days by than. Funny how many hours might you have spent on doing ordinary stuff like washing up, shaving, or even sleeping?

Did you use your life time responsible, happy and worth living?

Not all of us can say so. Plans been made and never got there. Illness and the normal deterioration as we age kicked in.

Youth might have wasted time when young, as many people in their later years remark how short it all seems and how fast time flew by!

Time is perhaps the most precious resource of all, but many people only understand that when its too late.

Go and make the most of the day! 

 

 

Life crumbles away just like a cliff at the beach

The journey is more important than the destination

The journey is more important than the destination. The goal is our path!

My father always used to  say "when I retire ... then I can do this and that ...". Well, unfortunately, this wishful thinking could not be implemented with him. Advanced diabetes has largely taken away his sight and thus his love, talent, skill and diligence in painting was suddenly stopped. And that pretty much at the same time as the pension notice. What a sad turning point. What does this teach us? 

 Do it! And do it now!

 

I m dead

We all have to; want, may, will and can die one day. In this respect we all become the same in death. A big difference is only present when it comes to how die? General desire to go to bed happy and content in the evening when you are very old and to fall asleep gently when you are as old as possible... that would be nice.

 The reality is different. German figures.

1st place: heart failure. The year before last, more than 7 million people (12.9 percent) succumbed to this disease worldwide.

2nd place: Blood clots in the head, also known as a stroke. After all, 6.2 million victims worldwide.

3rd place: Other lower respiratory tract infections kill 3.2 million people. .

4th place: COPD. It sounds harmless, but it is the lung disease that kills 3 million people worldwide every year. Is usually self-inflicted, through smoking.

Place 5: 1.6 million people succumbed to the AIDS virus in 2011. 6th place: According to the WHO, smoking is one of the greatest dangers. terlima-news - Cancer of the lungs and bronchi are therefore the

6th most common cause of death. In total, 1.5 million people died directly from smoking in 2011.

7th place: Diabetes was the cause of death for 1.4 million people worldwide in 2011.

8th place: Traffic accidents are one of the most common causes of death worldwide. 1.3 million people died in road traffic accidents in 2011. Incidentally, a 10% increase in the number of cases in Germany.

Death

Life never ends - or does it?

Buddhism represents the doctrine that killing is wrong as a principle. It is forbidden to kill an animal, or even kill an insect. I believe that life is not only existing in living organisms such as animals, but even the profane tomato, in any vegetables, fruits and even in every blade of grass.

Life comes from the universe, it is part of it and it it not understood at all what it really is yet. We just guess and assume, make decisions they suit us or believe what others tell us.. Why should it be wrong to kill an animal to eat it? However, to cut the grain and threshing is any better? I mean in the eyes of the universe all are the same. Humans, animals and plants. The sea, the clouds, the heat and the cold. It is all the same.

Better dead than red

"Better dead than red" was one of the popular slogans used to warn the people starkly about what would happen to them if a "red government" came to power. That was when I was just out of childhood, and my dear mother was still a wonderful, mature woman and, after all, the mother of seven children.

Today, almost 40 years later, I rewrite the slogan and say, "Better dead than in a home, nursing home, retirement home, or whatever these horrific places of elderly care are called."

On Sunday, I visited my mother in her care facility, a complete disaster. She has to be there because we're deluding ourselves, deluding ourselves that living as long as possible is better than voluntarily ending our lives at the appropriate time. Today, we live naively and shirk almost all critical decisions.

 Yet it's clear that things can't go on like this. We're enraged about battery hen cages or the hunting of whales. And us? What happens when we're old? A retirement home! Survive as long as possible, at a dehumanizing level, in stench, degraded, don't die and make a bed available, constantly choking down all the prescribed pills and medicine, life between life and death, undignified, immature, cruel.

 I'll rewrite the slogan and say, better dead than a retirement home! The photo shows a magnificent cliff on the south coast of England. And as long as there's no solution in this society, I'll use my freedom and, in due time, jump off that very cliff. Fly like a bird to paradise.