Leaving the legacy in life rather than in death

The last few months have truly been my annus horribilis but I guess that… 

 if it doesn’t kill you, it simply makes you stronger!!! 

I truly now see death as a very real part of the daily lives that we live and given I seem to have been surrounded by it in the last few months I certainly have had time to reflect on how to cope and move forward and make some changes in my life.
I wanted to share some of these thoughts via this blog.

There have been so many wonderful people that have surrounded and supported me during this difficult time and I certainly see that we all deal so differently with loss and challenges.
Whether it be the loss of a pet or a human, it will always be about the level of connection and relationship that you had, rather than whether it is human or animal... so I guess it’s okay to compare.
  

Planning my father's funeral last week certainly gave me some wonderful insights to the industry of death and some points of reflection that I'd like to pass on…

There is truly no point to hurry to get someone to their final destination; burnt or buried.
It is important to take time. Often in celebrating the life that is gone we will fail to do justice to the life they have had, so why rush the process; especially amidst our grief.
Our family decided to take 10 days to plan Dad’s funeral and each and every day new things came to the fore that in turn became part of the celebration of Dad's life.
It gave us time to involve all those that had been close to him in the funeral planning process, seek out some wonderful images of the life that he'd enjoyed to show on the day and consider the content of the order of service (which we added to constantly). So many of the family were able to visit Dad in the funeral home and say a final goodbye.
I was honoured to deliver the main eulogy. This also grew every day with new content and memories as the family had endless conversations on the man he was to us and these continued throughout the week.
I honestly believe that we did an excellent job of celebrating who Dad was to so many and enabling all that were close to him to contribute to the ultimate farewell.

Other thoughts that I have had have been driven by the reading of Dad’s Will. Sure he has left us all a small nest egg but one that he will never get to see us all spend and enjoy. He will never share any of the milestones that are earned from the money that he has shared on his death.

I am a big believer of leaving the legacy in my lifetime and looking at how the income that I have generated can perhaps help others that surround and are important to me while I am alive.
I am loving being part of the fruits of this, seeing the very real achievements, milestones and successes of those that I have decided to assist.
Sure I will always need to be aware of my time frame on this earth, making sure that I endeavour to provide for this and others that I will need to look after but there are many of us that could chose to make a bigger difference in our lifetime than we are now by sharing some of our time knowledge and available income… certainly worth giving it some thought!