How long do you have?

I was going to write something different this week,

It was my birthday a couple of days ago, and I was already thinking about how quickly time passes when I received an email telling me that a friend’s husband recently died. Well that was a massive shock, and so unexpected as we didn’t know he was ill.

It got me thinking;

None of us know how long we have left.

Hopefully you’ll have a long and full life, and what if you didn’t?

And at the risk of sounding like Lance Corporal Jones in Dad’s Army by running round shouting ‘Don’t Panic,’ it has to be said that:

Your time is limited.

If you knew you only had six months, a year or two years … how different would your life be?

Personally I’m not doing too badly; I’ve made many changes over the last couple of years and overall my life is pretty good. Yes there are more changes I could make and I’m going to think seriously about them over the next few weeks.

If you’ve read this quote from Steve Jobs before, apologies, it’s really powerful don’t you think?

don't live someone else's life R
Your time is limited

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.
Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.
Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice.
And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.
They somehow already know what you truly want to become.
Everything else is secondary.”

And if this this were true;

  • What would you change?

  • What’s the life that YOU want to live?

  • What would you do differently?

  • What do your heart and intuition tell you about what you truly want to become?

  • What do you want to look back on and say ‘yes I’m glad I did that’?

Please don’t waste your life living someone else’s.

Over to you

What are you going to do to ensure that you’re living your life and not someone else’s? Please leave your ideas and comments below.

If you find this daunting or you’re not sure what action to take, I’d love to help you. You can book a complimentary session via my online diary or leave a message on my contact page and we can spend 20 to 30 minutes to get clarity on how we can work together to create a life you love.

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10 thoughts on “How long do you have?”

  1. Lesley, this is such a timely reminder to follow our own path. I teach Buddhist meditation (in my free time) and one of my favourite topics is meditation on death – not to be morbid but to encourage us to live a meaningful life right now.

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  2. I love this quote, Lesley…. it is incredibly powerful and no matter how many times I read it, it always manages to both move and inspire me.
    Here’s to ‘courage’.
    K x

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  3. Hi Lesley,
    This email has come to me on a day when a work colleague who was in her late thirties has passed away from cancer, and when I am due to hold a mediatation session this evening to reflect on teh past year and look to the future , so very timely thoughts indeed!

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  4. Just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed YOUR TIME IS LIMITED. Very useful to be reminded of this – so often we live in the future (“one day”) and by everyone-else’s rules.

    Recently my dad died. I remember looking at his body in the bed and thinking: one day that will be me, and who knows when that will be ?? it really has spurred me on to make some changes and FINALLY get on with doing things that I really want to do but continually put off until “one day”. One of the things it’s made me do is to book a holiday to Cuba ! have wanted to go there for years, so to hell with paying the mortgage off faster or putting more money in savings. Am also about to enter a novel writing competition. Time to grab some of those dreams.

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  5. Thanks so much for your comments ladies,
    Here’s to having the courage to follow our own path, & to grabbing our dreams & making them happen.
    Lesley x

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  6. Hi Lesley, great article on a super important topic! And the quotation is amazing – I think I will print it and frame it 🙂 It’s quite recent that I started to think about life as NOT never ending (I guess that’s one of the advantages with passing 40 – that we stop taking life for granted and more start to view it as something precious to appreciate) and I’ve made some big changes. Whenever I feel scared for change I try to ask myself what kind of life I want to look back on when (if) I get old. It defenitely helps!

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  7. Great post, Lesley, and I love the Steve Jobs quote.

    I had my own ‘wake-up’ call with a cancer diagnosis back in 2003 and will always be grateful for that kick up the backside that jolted me out of ‘living someone else’s life’.

    Our time here is, indeed, limited – let’s have the courage to trust our heart and intuition, and savour every precious moment!

    Reply
  8. Hi Lesley,
    Love this post and the Steve Job’s quote, as Kate says a timely reminder to follow your own path. I take inspiration from George Elliott’s quote in that ‘It’s never too late to be who you might have been’ – sometimes we need those ‘wake up’ moments to remind us to grab life by the balls and live it on our own terms.

    Reply
  9. Hi Lesley
    This is such a lovely quote and one we could all live by if only we take the time to slow down and reflect. I work for CRUSE which has helped me to realise that our time here can be brief, though there are still times I take things and people for granted. It is a lesson that I am still learning.

    Reply

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