Life Or Something Like It...

For the past month and change I've been reading a lot of Chuck Klosterman - and I've started to realize that his stylized format of writing is something I really enjoy. Now, do I agree with everything he says? No - but I do enjoy the fact that he is someone who is willing to look at the scope of things from an angle which someone like me (ie straight-line thinker) never would.

In his book, Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs, there is an interesting question he poses at one point. It is as follows:

You have a brain tumor. Though there is no discomfort at the moment, this tumor would unquestionable kill you in six months. However, your life can (and will) be saved by an operation; the only downside is that there will be a brutal incision to your frontal lobe. After the surgery, you will be significantly less intelligent. You will still be a full functioning adult, but you will be less logical, you will have a terrible memory, and you will have little ability to understand complex concepts or difficult ideas. The surgery is in two weeks. How do you spend the next fourteen days?

Although I've read this book several times since I bought it just over a month ago - this is a question I always look for and often think about. I try to imagine I am the person about to go into surgery - but then before I get started on the fourteen day trek to the operating room - I often ask myself a counter question:

Suppose the doctor told you that if you elect to have the surgery, there would be no certainty that the person who awakens from the drug induced sleep would be you. That there was a possibility that the person you were before the operation would cease to exist. Now how would you approach the question? Would you decide to live the next six months enjoying every moment you could? would you still elect to have the surgery because you value life - although there is a possibility that the person you know may never come out of that operation?

Furthermore, how would you look at life in the following days while you contemplate that decision? Would you be in a daze looking at the cracks in the sidewalk? would you look up around you and see the people above you looking at you? would you finally recognize the people who have always been there for you and loved you unconditionally even though you rarely (if ever) acknowledged their presence?

Obviously the answer is going to be different to everyone, but regardless life is something that is too valuable to take for granted. We often times waste our lives worrying about the unimportant - and although it would be nice to say that we are all ambitious enough to chase after the dreams that stir us to the core - not all of us have it in us to stand up and do what others could only dream of. Yet, if you were faced with the questions above - look at how you would have responded and approached the coming days of your life.

In short - stop wasting time. Live life for what it is - a gift. Love passionately, live intently, and approach life with purpose. Because what we may have today may be gone tomorrow.