We were talking about a neighbor who died this past year.
Two days before dying, she confessed to a friend, “I’m afraid of death. I never really lived. I had these dreams I wanted to do. I had these places I wanted to visit.”
How tragic. And I wondered, “Was there anything in her life that would have allowed us to see her life ending like this?”
I asked Karen about it and she said, “Yeah, she was always concerned with doing things the right way. She was concerned with appearances. I tried to keep my distance from her.”
It’s a sad story, but it gives me courage. We live in an overcautious society that is perpetually measuring risk. We parse it out in dribbles. Too many of us, having believed the lie about what we can’t do, never learn what we can do. We never put our trust in a God who wants to do “exceeding abundantly.”
I’ve made it my ambition to live life without regrets. I want to suck the marrow out.*
I don’t want to wind up looking back and wishing I’d had the courage to commit to my dreams.
How about you? What dreams will you commit to in 2012?
Amen. This is inspiring. Thanks for sharing this brief, but important manifesto for living, Seth.
Well, at least her last words are used to spur others on to go for the dreams! Woo hoo! Here we go!
Great post!
I often wonder how many people feel this way when they reach the end. It is so difficult sometimes to not get comfortable, to not settle and just keep up appearances, but when you consider this the cost of just being acceptable and ordinary is entirely to high.
As for 2012, I’ve had a lot of conversations lately with different people about dreams. Of course that’s the easy part, doing them takes a bit more courage that I’m working to find in the next few days. 🙂
My 2012 dream: refinish my basement and then quit my job. Both need to happen so I can become a foster parent for refugee kids. The dream had been established. Now I just have to wait.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us… Eph 3:20
My dream is to see the Body of Christ take God at his word to DO immeasurably more than we could ever dream. What an adventure!