We have all at one time or another seen a person across a room or walking toward us on a street and said to ourselves that it looked like a person we know but it couldn’t possibly be them for we assumed that they were in another place. Finally, when we get closer or hear their voice, we find ourselves saying, “Yes, it is you!”
This was my experience recently in another context. I first said to myself that the obituary I was reading was about a person with the same name of a former student because she was young. Reading the obituary further told me that it was indeed a former student, Alison Hadden, age 41, who had died from stage 4 breast cancer, the worst possible kind with the fewest treatment options. She was diagnosed in 2018. It was not found early.
She turned her terror and anxiety into something positive for the world by developing a website and project called the NO TIME TO WASTE PROJECT where she found meaning by sharing what she learned about living as a result of confronting dying. She was an entrepreneur and marketing executive in her professional life so she was able to share her new found perspective by giving addresses, workshops, seminars, commencement speeches, and podcasts about embracing life in the present. According to her obituary she recorded 47 podcasts including with Katie Couric, Matthew McConaughey, Lance Armstrong, doctors, executives and many more. Her drive was to help people as much as she could before she died. It filled her with a new energy that she referred to as a “superpower.”
Basketball was her game. She was the first girl to score 1000 career points at EA. The obituary indicates that she was asked by the Inquirer whether she would consider challenging Kobe Bryant, who at the time went to a local high school. Her response was, “I’d love to go one on one with him.” What the obituary didn’t say is that, in all likelihood, she wasn’t kidding. She had so much energy that made her “live our loud.” I can still picture her coming down the court with that look on her face that said, “You better get out of my way.” She ran down a different court with her opponent being cancer but she said the same thing in real life, “You better get out of my way.”
I have posted one of Alison’s Ted Talks below. Watch it! It will make a difference in your life. Focus on the Nietzsche quote, and her words and actions to live by.
I particularly want you to focus on Momento Mori which is Latin for “Remember you will die.” It is the second EA alumna who I have heard use this phrase. Alex Bilotti died of Ewing’s Sarcoma. She fought her entire time at EA and through part of her time at Penn to conquer the disease. I have an orange rubber bracelet with her initials and the word courage still on my wrist. In a chapel address she said this about Momento Mori, “Don’t dwell on it, don’t get lost in it, just remember it and live your life accordingly.”
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The emperor of the Roman Empire had two servants follow him who were required to repeat “Momento Mori” to keep him humble and his power in check. They were his constant companions. Marcus Aurelius said, “You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you say and think.”
As I write this we are in the season of Lent when Jesus spent forty days in the wilderness being tempted by the devil. We began with Ash Wednesday and hear those words, “Remember you are dust and to dust you will return.” In essence those words have the same meaning as Momento Mori. We need to hold onto those words throughout the Lenten season and beyond. They are the key to a meaningful happy life. It is a paradox that the more we are aware of our death, the more we can live a fuller life. How you view death is how you live life. To me the central words of Lent are found in that declaration, “Remember that you are dust and to dust you will return.”
Jesus’ journey in the wilderness is our journey in the wilderness of life. But there are more words to add to Momento Mori. They are words that we hear clearly when Jesus is tempted by the devil and he responds with, “You better get out of my way!” He doesn’t stop there. He proclaims after his crucifixion and His death, “Death, you better get out of my way!” I am here to bring the abundant life of the Resurrection. But we don’t get to that Easter declaration in our lives lived until we say to ourselves, “Momento Mori.
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