How Many Wake-Up Calls Do You Need?
Last week, I received an email letting me know that Susan passed away.
I met Susan years ago through my Speakers Association chapter. While we never become “best buddies,” we certainly got to know each other over the years and became friends.
Most recently, Susan joined the chapter’s “Pro Track” program, which is a year long course deigned to help speakers craft their speeches and improve there presentation skills. I am overseeing the program, and I was excited to see Susan’s excitement and passion for her message come through. She had survived cancer, and it had given her a message that she wanted to share with the world.
Then the cancer came back, and a short time later she was gone.
The news hit me, as all such announcements do, with sadness and regret. It also made me think about my own life.
Upon receiving the email, I thought to myself, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
The thought stopped me in tracks as I realized that this was not the first time I had this thought.
About a year and a half ago, another friend and Speakers Association member, John, passed away. At the time, I thought to myself, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
I may have taken some action, but within two weeks I was more or less back to living the same life I always had.
A few months before that Greg Giraldo, my favorite stand-up comedian, passed away. He was only 44, and that hit me hard too. I remember thinking, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
A few years before that, my best friend’s wife was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She survived, and is doing fine now, but it was a tough time. I remember thinking, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
Two years before that, my aunt passed away very unexpectedly. I remember thinking, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
Two years before that, doctors found a blockage in my dad’s arteries. He ended up needing a quadruple bypass. He too is now doing fine, but that was a very tough time. I remember thinking, “Wow, life is short. I really need to make sure I value every precious moment I have on this planet, and do whatever I can to live my life to the fullest. This is my wake up call.”
See a pattern?
Every time, over and over, a significant event happened in my life that made me take stock and resolve to live differently, and yet every time I fell back into my same old patterns, my same old life.
People can and do change, often as a result of experiencing a serious, “life or death” experience. The question is, why do we need to wait for such a horrible experience to take stock and make some changes? Why do so many “close calls” have no lasting impact? Why is it that when the tragedy happens to someone we know but are not super close to that we are able to disassociate ourselves and just go about our merry little lives?
You probably don’t know any of the people I mentioned above, but I’m sure you can come up with a long list of “wake up calls” from your own life that perhaps you have ignored once some time passed.
The goal of this post is to serve as a “wake up call” for you. Think about your list of wake-up calls, think about all the things you resolved to change, and think about how little you actually did change. Pick one now and start. Don’t wait for your next near death experience. Just get started.
Let me ask:
How many wake-up calls do you need?
Believe me, one is more than enough. Get started now.
***
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About
By Avish Parashar. As the world's only Motivational Improviser, Avish uses techniques from the world of improv comedy to engage, entertain, and educate audiences on ideas around change, creativity, and motivation. Connect with Avish on Google+
6 Responses to “How Many Wake-Up Calls Do You Need?”
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Thanks for this message, Avish. It continues to amaze me that the Universe keeps sending me such timely messages. Just yesterday I took an irreversible step to ensure that I will be valuing every precious moment in my life. It was a very scary step, but your post has served to remind me that I made a good choice and has also helped to bolster my courage.
This is a great message and I hope that it serves as a wake-up call to many who are looking for it.
My two cents: the reason wake-up calls don’t work—and the corollary, why you’ve had so many—is that it’s very romantic to think of the epiphany that changes your life, but human beings don’t work that way. We’re more creatures of habit. What you’re discussing is pretty much a flow state of emotional connection, and as we all know, flow states are usually hard to come by.
Put another way, I’ve spent my entire life knowing that the odds were vanishingly small that I’d be here at all—but at the moment, I’m paying much more attention to the slight twinge in my back, or to the need to make another cup of coffee.
So rather than putting “I promise to be a wholly-realized human being for the rest of my life” on your to-do list, which will never happen, the trick is to do small discrete things that do the same. Some examples I try:
1) Put as many non-routine events on your calendar as possible. For me it’s travel. The more novelty, the more you notice.
2) Make note of which events are more rare than routine, whether that’s a meal you can’t get at home, or time with a friend or family member you don’t see often. If you think of seeing someone once a year as routine, you won’t notice. Think of it as 1/365th of your time, and it’s easier.
3) It’s absolutely impossible to “live every day as if it’s your last;” there are damn good reasons why we’re more circumspect. But I try to go out of my way to connect with people around me, and usually that’s by introducing something novel in their environment. I.e., “Hey. That’s a great tie.”
Thanks Don! It’s funny, this idea that “the universe keeps sending us messages” is something I talk about in my speech and “Say ‘Yes, And'” book – I just didn’t connect it directly in this post! But basically, we all say a lot of “yes, but” to stay right where we are, regardless of the wake-up calls we get…
Thanks for the two cents Jeff. In my experience and research there are two ways people change:
1 – Gradually, by slowly changing and.or breaking habits. The suggestions you provided are some excellent ways to achieve this
2 – All at once, often (but not always) in response to some external stimulus. People do sometimes change due to epiphany. Personally, I knwo i let myself get way too fat during my senior year in college. I struggled to lose the weight, and then one day a friend made an off-handed joke about me being fat. That was the first time I realized, “wow, my friends see me as a fat person.” That kicked my ass into changing my ways, and the next day I started running and two months later I had dropped the college weight. So it can happen, if we find and utilize the right motivators.
Thanks for the suggestions!
Thanks for the Wake Up Call…I’ve had several ‘near death’ experiences that certainly have given me a sense of what’s important in life. While my primary business is PR and writing, I do capture life stories in print and DVD. Several years ago I wrote my own obituary. It was the hardest thing, but perhaps the most meaningful thing, I’ve ever written. I go back to it every year to update it and see if I’m on track with my goals. I’ve given the obit to two friends in the event that I don’t make it off of the Surekill Expressway one day. I have also placed it with my will and have planned the details of my memorial service, along with key organizations to contact when I die. I’ve just turned 50 and hope to lead a long and productive life, but ya never know. I recently did a DVD/booklet for a 93-year-old woman who came back to me and asked me to write a draft of her obituary. I was honored to receive this request.
Avish,
All I can say to your observations are “Wow, wow, wow.”
And “yes, Yes, YES!!!”
In addition to the sadness and loss that we feel when our friends like Susan and John leave us, there is most definitely a wake-up call. The problem – and I’m first in line – is that we tend to hit the “Snooze” button and decide that yes, it’s sad they’re gone. Yes, life is short. Yes, we need to make the most of every moment, personally and professionally and spiritually… and and and… [Snooze]
I have these bills to pay – I have this family issue – I need to tweak my business or career this way or that – I have to wait until I have more stability/money/time to improve my current situation. But… but… but…
You are 10,000% right. The time is now. The place is here. The person that needs to act is YOU. Me. All of us. My good pal Terry Hawkins, CSP has a book and a speech titled “There are only 2 times – Now and Too Late.”
This is the cold hard truth folks – whatever it is you’re put on this planet to DO – get going. The big clock is ticking and we all have less time than we think.
Our friends like Susan and John and the other good folks who have passed on from each of our lives are watching. Encouraging us. Telling us to “Go. Truly. Now!”
And I’m confident they are looking forward to seeing our success down here — before we join them up there!!!