October Advent: In Which I Write Every Day About Death

For the past six months I’ve had a hankering to write a post about death every day in October leading up to Halloween.

I’m not entirely sure why I want to do it. I haven’t gone emo. I don’t feel morbid. I still don’t care much for Tim Burton movies. So…

All I know is that two ideas have been rattling around my mind for some time. The first idea is from Steve Jobs’s Stanford graduation speech. It’s the famous excerpt wherein he talks about how death itself compels us to be moral.

Jobs says:

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.

Almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

The second idea is from David Brooks (and probably others). In a TED talk he gave, Brooks drew a distinction between living a life to build a good résumé and living a life to build a good eulogy. It’s a simple idea, but the implications have stayed with — or haunted? — me. I want to live a life that ends with a beautiful eulogy, but the truth tells me I just haven’t done that yet.

And so maybe that is the reason for this advent. Halloween, I’ve recently re-learned, means “All Hallowed Evening” or “Holy Evening.” All my life the holiday has been void of anything holy — or even anything reflective. This advent calendar, then, is an exercise to force reflection on an important part of life.

May these posts be free from anxiety, morbidity, and overweening solemnity. May they complement the Twixes and the Pixy Stixes we all squeeze down this happy season.