Life Is Short

It appears that everything always comes together. Once I hear one thing, then I keep hearing it. Just like when I got my job in the Innovation Team, I kept hearing the word innovation constantly – that example is quite similar to the topic I chose to write about.

                Just recently it’s really coming to light that life really is short. It’s been a year and a half since I left education, a year into my full time job and less than a month until I’m 18. This is a big shock for me as every day seemed to drag and time would move so slowly for me. I used to count down the time until I could get back into bed again and even that felt more like five days, not five hours. Now I complain more about there not being enough hours in the day and everything is passing me by so quickly. That in its self was enough to give me a kick up the arse to start making the most of the time I have on this earth.

                Though there was a few other things that made me change my mind set. I’m making the most of things, keeping myself happy and making sure the things I do are for my own benefit, no one else’s. And these changes were made from the words of a few people. First of being my mum. She’s in the south of France currently, and if you knew her well enough then you’d know that this isn’t out of the ordinary. I make a joke to her that England is more like a holiday seen as she’s never in her home country. She enjoys her holidays and so she should with the stressful job that she has. When she told me she was leaving for two weeks, we got into conversation and one thing she said stuck with me most

                ‘You don’t live long and you only live once, it’s best to make the most of it because you’ll never know when your chances are up’

                Hearing this on a Tuesday morning at 8am set me going through the whole day.  What IF I was to be put on my deathbed tomorrow, would I be happy to have the ‘life flashing before my eyes’ moment? Would I be happy with what I saw? And it got me thinking, I have spent a lot of my time doing things that I thought other people wanted me to do or doing things purposely to make other people smile. It’s all well and good wanting to do the right thing for others, but I then realised how little time I actually spent putting myself first and doing things that made me happy. That had to change.

                The next person that spoke within the same week (two days later in fact) on the same subject was one of the Board of Directors to the company I work for. We’ve just taken on a group of 17 apprentices and they had a one to one session with this guy to ask him questions, learn about the company and to learn how he had climbed the ranks as he started in the same position as the apprentices all those years ago. The last question that someone asked was

‘Would you change anything?’

And I have to tell you that his response was the most inspiring thing I’ve heard in those four walls.

                ‘Well son, there’s three parts to that answer. The first, I’m a man of no regrets. I don’t believe in them. Everything I’ve done has made me the man I am and got me here today. The second, if I HAD to change anything it would be to make more time for the things I loved. I wanted to be a pilot…and it took me until a few years ago to finally put my foot forward and take lessons and now I can fly solo. I wish I would have done that sooner, but I still ended up doing it anyway. And the last, I’ve only ever done the things that made me happy. Life is too short to be miserable, and that’s where your regrets come from – being miserable. The best advice I can give you, if anything, is to make sure you’re happy. If you’re happy then you’ve succeeded’.