T

May 23rd

SHOW    ME  HOW TO  LIVE

“Show   me  that    the good    life    doesn’t consist in  its length, but in  its use,    and that    it  is  possible—no,

entirely    too common—for  a   person  who has had a   long    life    to  have    lived   too little.”

—SENECA,    MORAL   LETTERS,    49.10b

here’s no need to show Seneca. Show yourself. That no matter how many years you’re ultimately
given, your life can be clearly and earnestly said to have been a long and full one. We all know
someone like that—someone we lost too early but even now think, If I could do half of what they did, I’ll
consider my life well lived.
The best way to get there is by focusing on what is here right now, on the task you have at hand—big
or small. As he says, by pouring ourselves fully and intentionally into the present, it “gentle[s] the passing
of time’s precipitous flight.”