his kids’ sporting events, reward good grades, and ensure our path to college; he also continually reminded his boys that life is not to be wasted. For 32 years, I had been on the
receiving end of this wisdom, and yet I had spent the last several years restless and disillusioned in office settings. I once promised myself that I would never inhabit a cubicle, but broke that promise when I was promoted to the executive floor of a global company as a corporate communications writer.
FINDING MY OWN WAY On my first day in the new role, my boss walked me around the cubicle farm, passing offices for directors, vice presidents, and C-level executives. “Pick any cubicle you want,” she
offered, as if it were a great honor to select a windowless box where I would stare at a screen for eight hours a day, five days a week. “It looks like a prison,” I said. She gave me a puzzled look (through
experience, I learned not to speak in such ways among the institutionalized). At my next job, I had an office, but I still felt caged. Between meetings, I would gaze out my third-floor window into the busy square, my eyes flitting over pedestrians, like an eager puppy following hummingbirds at the feeder. To decompress after work I would
visit the gym for a spin class, where I would bounce up and down for an hour, synchronizing to mashups and remixes. Later, I would sprawl out on the couch and watch Charlie Rose tilt his head at newsmakers. It’s difficult to complain, I suppose. I had a stimulating job in a stimulating
//UNCONSCIOUSLY, I THINK WE’RE ALL
SCARED OF DYING. WE DENY OUR OWN MORTALITY, BECAUSE THE CONCEPT OF NONEXISTENCE IS TOO DIFFICULT TO BEAR.//
city at a stimulating workplace; a Cambridge-based biomedical research institute, which some scientists likened to an artist’s colony. But I was decidedly overstimulated. Intellectually, I was pleased with the life I had built, but my body was just along for the ride – I was living from the neck up. I feared if I didn’t make a change, my body would rebel against my mind. My dad and I were eating dinner at the
kitchen table when I brought up what seemed like his favorite subject. “Are you afraid of death?” I asked. His face contorted into a confused,
almost defensive expression. “No, Dustin, I’m not afraid of death.” “Why do you talk about it so much?” He took a sip of tequila. “I don’t
know.” I wondered if he was more afraid than
average, but had never admitted it to himself. Unconsciously, I think we’re all scared
of dying. We deny our own mortality, because the concept of nonexistence is too difficult to bear. We conduct our lives as if we are not destined for old
age, illness, and an inevitable death. We forget that nothing is permanent, including ourselves. I think discussing death is my dad’s
way of dealing with this existential dread. It might be a subconscious way of nourishing the notion of impermanence, keeping it close so he wouldn’t forget that nothing lasts. And, in doing so, it would propel him to live a richer, fuller life. “I’m afraid of dying,” I admitted. I didn’t have a clear answer as to why.
A lifetime doesn’t seem like enough time. I’m convinced I won’t be able to say everything I need to say, learn everything I want to learn, do everything I hope to do. “I’m also not sure if anything happens
when the lights go out. Not yet, at least.” I confessed that the apple hadn’t
fallen far from the tree: I knew that life was appallingly brief. But while I found my dad’s advice inspiring, I occasionally found it paralyzing. Working 9-5, I sometimes overwhelmed myself with the idea that I was misspending my days. I told my dad, “It’s not always easy
living in the shadow of your awareness of death.” I didn’t yet know how to design my life in accordance with his wisdom. He told me that I would figure it out,
but then rather callously fanned the flames of my angst. “I could never live like you and your brother: living in the same city – any city, for that matter – working in the same building, and taking orders from a boss.” He was particularly hostile toward the idea of waiting until retirement
PINNACLE HEALTH CLINIC
Withania Ginkgo Moringa 1300 366 232 Rhodiola
Turmeric + 46 others
Marshmallow
"A Year of Living Herbally"
www.PinnacleClinic.com/herbal
Introducing Pinnacle's To find out more:
127003i205 SEPTEMBER | OCTOBER 2017 27
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