Life is shorter than you think

This is just a comment I found today on FB - ‘Life is short, people’. It was posted under the news of the death of a woman I used to work with some 25 years ago. Someone I haven’t seen or heard from in a long time, but she must have been my age, around 50. And she just dropped dead. Another comment read - ‘So few of us are left’. Again, in a group of middle-aged people who, according to statistics, shouldn’t have to worry about death.
I’ve long had this suspicion that we might be misled by life expectancy statistics into believing there’s a lot of time left. So it’s OK to postpone many things you might want to do under the assumption there’s going to be plenty of time for those. Like in a few years, when you get to a certain place in your career, once you’ve attained some financial stability. What if you don’t have all that time left?

A few months ago, I remember having a conversation on this topic with a friend of mine, following the premature death of a local media personality - in his 50s, of this same drop dead syndrome. You’d expect such news to serve as a wake-up call for people, yet my friend would hear none of it. The happiness she longs for is still somewhere down the line, she’ll just wait a bit longer. ‘I’ve waited for 25 years already…’ How many people keep postponing their lives under this doubtful notion that there’s still time? Trapped in lives they don’t enjoy, in relationships that no longer bring them joy, working like crazy in the hope they will be financially secure when they’re old. One of my sisters was like that - working day and night to further her career and be secure in her old age. Only she never got to be old and sadly I don’t think anybody remembers how good her work was. The books she planned to read when she retires, oh, well…

According to statistics, the global life expectancy average is 71.5 years, with a few years more in the Western part of the world or Japan. Judging by these numbers, it makes sense to think you still have plenty of time when you’re 40 or 50 We take comfort looking at our parents and grandparents who lived to their 80s or 90s. When I was a kid, big family reunions meant loads of old people gathered round the table - aunts and great aunts happily singing songs of their youths. We secretly hope we’ll get to be like them, conveniently forgetting we’re a very different generation. None of those great aunts I remember had ever had to work, let alone work long hours under constant pressure. Those people grew up in a world with less stress, less pollution of any kind, less crap food, less toxic compounds in cosmetics. Nor did they pop pills all the time. My grandfather used to complain the doctor told him to cut down on cigarettes. But he was in his 80s by then, not like my friends who are in their 50s and are told the same thing after a heart-attack.
I don’t know if we can compare ourselves to the previous generation. I don’t know if we’re gonna be that merry bunch of old people at some future family reunion, so maybe making some time for visiting with friends and family right now might be the safer option. Or that trip you’re planning after your retirement - you might want to take it earlier…
Our belief in all that marvelous time we have left is based on something that looks like this - the life expectancy formula:

Whenever you postpone something you want to do, remember you’re betting your life on some bloody numbers you don’t even understand!

Listen to Ozzy: 'Life won't wait for you, my friend!'

Thanks for reading

Image Pixabay