A few weeks ago, I unfortunately had to attend a funeral for a family member. It was a sad time for my family, as it all happened very fast an unexpectedly. However, it was at this funeral where I believe my life has changed for the better, not because of the circumstances but because of the words in the eulogy.
As my family reminisced on the amazing human being reaching the gates of heaven with pictures and stories and the many times we all had laughed to the point of tears from his jokes, we got to the point of his eulogy.
I think his best friend was the person speaking, although I am not 100% sure, because I had never met the person who was speaking to my own memory. As he spoke the many great words, a certain section of his speech hit me hard, in a good way, and has left me thinking about it countless times since.
This particular section was talking about gravestones. As we all know gravestones particularly list the name, date of birth, and death date. However, everyone skips over the dash or the grammatically correct term: Hyphen.
That dash, represents the persons life. It doesn’t tell anyone anything, yet it represents so much. If you knew this person closely, then that dash represents more than others. If you didn’t know the person at all and are walking through a cemetery randomly, then that dash is a mystery
The dash means more if you knew them, and how well you knew them. That dash is the laughter, the vacations, the holidays, the fights, the makeups, the mistakes, the successes, the stories, the love, the memories, the endless fun. That dash is their life.
So what does this all mean? It means that each second, each minute, each hour, and each day what we do and how we do it is further adding to the stories of our dash. So, take the risk, have fun, do what you love, make friends, live life how you want to live life and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, its your dash not theirs.
Every morning since, I have thought about this ideology. Its almost like the speaker has locked the idea into my mind and thrown out the key. This is an important ideology to me, and one I will comeback to when in times of struggle or doubt. So the question is, how will you spend your life and how will others view your dash?
Thanks for reading!
That dash will tell our story. I love this. Thank you for sharing, James.