Who will continue to cry....

There is this book called "Who will cry when you die" by Robin Sharma. It is one of those books that exhort you to live your life in such a way that others are impacted by it, and that you are missed when you are gone.

There will be some people who will cry when I die.

There are always some people who cry when a person dies. Of course, barring the very poor, the lonelies and the sick. When some of these people die, there are in fact people who are relieved. It is profoundly sad that this is so.

The key question to ponder is about who will continue to cry after you have been dead. For a week, month, year. Think hard. Picture to yourself the day of your funeral. And then the next. The next week. The next month. The next year. Maybe three years after your death. And ask yourself this question - who will continue to cry after you have died. Picture the people doing their daily routines. Imagine the thoughts they would have, while they eat, drink, make a living, party etc. Ask yourself honestly - be brutally honest - will they spare one thought to you? Two? Several in a day? Once in a month? Once in a year? Will it be a happy thought? Grateful thought? Revengeful thought? Loving thought? These are questions you ask yourself of the people in your life today.

Life goes on. That is the tragedy and beauty of life. Everything passes. Even you.

Think about what your imagination is telling you about life after your death. About which people will continue to feel your absence, in a good, bad or indifferent way. The ones to focus on first is the indifferent ones. For the ones whose lives would continue with nary a thought for you, eliminate doing things for them in your current time. Eliminate estimating your lifes worth on what they think of you today. Or what you think they think of you. They don't really matter - in the short and long run. You do not really impact them. Maybe you never did. Purge them from your life.

Now examine the people who will miss you in a good way. Even weeks after you have gone, or even years. Nurture them, love them and try and maximise your impact in a good way in their life. You really are a part of their lives. Choose to work hard on them. It is important to you, and to them.

And now, the ones who curse you when you are gone. Look hard - if there anything you have done to have earned that blame or curse? Fix it if you can. If not, then accept their curses, eliminate thoughts about them from your head and let them cease existing for you today. These could be people who you can do nothing about. Cultivate the wisdom to accept their prickly existence in your life, and stop trying to please them.

Now, besides the people who would cry when you die, think of the people who won't cry when you die, but whose life would be impacted by what you did in life. Maybe these people have never met you. Could you have impacted some people in your life even though you did not know them? Picture the impact. Maybe your work has made them spend one hour less doing repetitive boring stuff in their lives. Maybe you helped them reach their goals with less barriers. Maybe science and thought progressed in a different way because you lived and worked. It does not matter that they were not in your funeral. They could not have been there even if they wanted to - they don't even know you exist!

If you can picture such people, your life would have lived beyond your death in some measure.

Can't think of anyone like that? Maybe you need to look at your lifes work to know if there is some work you need to start so that someone is impacted due to your death. Someone you don't know. Someone who you still nevertheless love. Invest in that love. Invest in a ever lasting life.