The Story of Your Life

Here's a bit from the beginning of the movie When Harry Met Sally. They've just left the University of Chicago on their road trip to New York City (please note, this is from memory, so it may not be exact)  . . . . .

Harry: So why don't you tell me the story of your life.
Sally: The story of my life? The story of my life isn't going to get us out of Chicago! I mean, nothing's happened to me yet.
Harry: Is that why you're moving to New York--so something will happen to you?
Sally: I suppose.
Harry: Like what?
Sally: Like I'm going to journalism school to become a journalist.
Harry: So you can write about things that happen to other people ...
Sally (perturbed): That's one way of looking at it.
Harry: Suppose nothing happens to you. Suppose you live there your whole life, nothing happens, and you die one of those slow New York deaths where no one notices for two weeks until the stench drifts into the hallway ...

My father died when he was 44. I was 25. Today happens to be my birthday (I'm now 34) and every birthday since my dad died I have thought to myself When dad was my age he only had X number of more years to live.

So that means when dad was my age, he had 10 more years left. And I was about 14 at the time.

Ten years! That's a blink, less than a nano-second in the grand scheme of things.

Thinking about this could become morbid if I allowed myself to dwell on it. But it's not morbidity that I'm after. Rather, it helps me think about life, and specifically my life.

Put another way: What is the story of my life?

Who have I loved? Who have I helped? Who have I wronged and/or harmed? What have I done, accomplished, and achieved? Is the world a better place because of me and my actions? And a host of other questions that are quite sobering.

In his thought-provoking and fantastic book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller begins with an author's note that says this:

"If you watched a movie about a guy who wanted a Volvo and worked for years to get it, you wouldn't cry at the end when he drove off the lot, testing the windshield wipers. You wouldn't tell your friends you saw a beautiful movie or go home and put a record on to think about the story you'd seen. The truth is, you wouldn't remember that movie a week later, except you'd feel robbed and want your money back. Nobody cries at the end of a movie about a guy who wants a Volvo."

"But we spend years actually living those stories, and expect our lives to be meaningful. The truth is, if what we choose to do with our lives won't make the story meaningful, it won't make life meaningful either."

If what we choose to do with our lives won't make the story meaningful, it won't make life meaningful either . . . And so I ask myself: What am I doing with my life? What's the story of my life?

Earlier this week I read a People Magazine article about Steve Jobs, the Apple co-founder and tech innovator who recently died from cancer. In the article Jobs was quoted as saying that he looked at himself every day in the mirror and asked himself: If this were the last day of my life would I want to be doing what I'm about to go do?

When the answer to that question is, "No," for too many days in row, Jobs said, it's time for some changes.

I wonder how often in my life I have passively sat back, let life come to me and happen to me, rather than trying to be an active participant who is molding and shaping a great story? It's probably been the case more than I care to honestly admit.

Of course, sometimes life does happen to us. There are devastating tragedies, twists and turns, losses, set-backs, reversals, sickness, sadness, and yes, death. Often these things are far beyond our control.

But one thing we can control is how we react to these situations. And how we react is a huge part of how the rest of our story unfolds from that moment on.

I know I don't always react well. But thinking about my life as an unfolding narrative has helped me to think a bit better about how to react when life happens than I may have in the past. And it has challenged me to be more decisive. Not to be so passive. And, as Donald Miller might say, get off the couch and into the game.

What's the story of my life? It's an unfolding narrative that's still relatively young. But then again, my dad's story was cut short long before I'm sure he ever thought it would when he was my age.

This I do know: If I become even half of the man my father was, the story of my life will be a good one.