The “Spiritual Guru” said on the tape: “Her lifeline is short.”
Then, I recall, there was just silence. The extremely short lifeline on the inside of my left hand confirmed his words.
Words do not have equal weight. Sources are not of equal weight. And recovery times also are not of equal weight.
I would die young. I wore that “fact” every day, everywhere, from the age of thirteen for about twenty years.
Those words would frame the hurried chaos and the “not-me” traditional choices I made in my career, who I chose to love, how I lived, and just about everything else that matters in life.
I am curious to know if he was secretly aware of the weight of his impending death from Stage 4 cancer? Did he know? Did he stay silent about knowing, in order to protect others? I wonder?
***
Can you imagine what went through Larry’s mind when I sat in front of him, telling I needed to get a life insurance policy because I would die soon? In front of him was a perfectly healthy nineteen- year-old.
I had already graduated from College at the age of eighteen. I was pursuing both a Law Degree and a Masters. I had traveled extensively. I drove a BMW 7 Series. I was confident, and professionally I was on my way to having a real-estate and mortgage-broker license under my belt. Yet there I was, preparing to die and being responsible about it.
They did not tell him he was going to die, in order to protect him. But I heard he was so curious, smart, and inquisitive. I know he would have made his own investigation on the course of his cancer. In preparing to die, did he create his own daily ritual? Did he think about how he wanted his family and friends to remember him? Or was he just too young—too scared?
***
I knew the minute I started practicing law at twenty-one that I was out of my professional skin. Yet, I put my head down, shone like a trophy on a shelf, and would show up at my office every day with my soul, heart, and passion left at the door. I rationalized that the suffering would end soon.
I knew I was not present or ready on the first kiss. He was two decades older, stable, already had a son, a good kind man and he was willing to accept whatever I gave. I acquiesced. I felt safe, and he would be able to handle my death. I armored up my heart so it would not exhale. I denied myself the beauty of losing control and just desiring passionately. I did not have children. I did not allow anyone to look into my eyes to see my sadness, to see that I was not really there. I just refused to love hard.
I compromised my values and stayed silent. I would tell myself: “THIS IS IT “. Every unexpected or bad thing that I did or did not feel good about, I justified by my end being near.
And then something really tragic happened to me in my early thirties. I faced the darkness in my typical style—alone.
I was so scared and broken to my core. I came to the edge of losing my sanity and life. My worse fear had now arrived.
And then something happened. In that moment of despair, knowing death is what was predicted for me, I became a lion.
I stood up, discarded the weight of those words and roared for the first time. I chose finally to LIVE.
In an act of rebellion and total irresponsibility, I stopped paying my life/death insurance premiums. Why? Everyone around me was financially fine, healthy, and perfectly capable of taking care of themselves. What the hell was I doing, thinking I had to provide for everyone?
Maybe all everyone wanted from me was to pull down the walls I had built to protect my delicate heart and allow love in?
Did he also compromise, knowing the end was near? What if there was a cure and he made it, would he have lived differently?
***
I am a teacher. I have loved education since I was two. My mom would have to dress me in my school uniform even on Saturdays, since school was always on my mind. I had been named Volunteer of the Year seven years in a row in my early twenties, for adopting inner-city schools and teaching them the soft skills needed in the workplace. I thought teaching was my hobby, that I happened to be really good at it.
Today, tens of thousands of youths and adults around the world call me “Miss,” “Doctor,” but my favorites are from the young guys who also try to hit on me— “Gorgeous Ma’am.”
My hugs are hard, linger, and they are warm. I connect with complete strangers in an instant. I look deep into their eyes and my soul spills out when I am with you. I am fully present and completely yours.
I have a Foundation that helps others discover their own identity. My Foundation has delivered to over 25,000 youths, and counting, twenty-first-century human skills, such as critical thinking, emotional IQ, creativity, etc. in at-risk communities in different parts of the world.
I am a hot mess and a work in progress. There are some days I feel like I don’t know a single thing.I no longer hide it. I am not a shiny trophy, but a deeply scared and imperfect human.
I am a published author. I remember still the feeling of “I made it!” when I walked into my favorite bookstore and saw my book, Who Will I Become?. It was right there, sitting tall with dignity on a shelf next to Robin Sharma, Brene Brown, Ariana Huffington, and every other author I stalk.
I am the most positive person you will ever meet. I wake up each day and say out loud: “Thank you for one more day.” And I mean it. Then I go about causing good trouble, encouraging others to set their identities on fire.
I am exploring what it means to love and be loved madly and deeply. My relationship skills are those of a twenty-year-old. I am totally rusty but, thank god, I have a great group of girlfriends who laugh with and at me about my adventures into discovering my femininity. I have fallen over on my nose, gotten heart-broken and had some innocent, magical moments of connection. The most important part is—I am no longer a robot but a real human in all my relationships.
And finally, I started my own technology company. This is the scariest thing I have ever done. I know nothing about coding or have experience with anything even remotely close to Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, etc. But you know what? — I am learning and doing it. I know identity. I know how to identify it and strengthen it. I know the pain of leaving it at the door. Identity is at the core of my patent-pending technology, and there is no stopping me—the rest I am learning as I go.
I bought him a pack of “playground of possibilities” cards on a trip to Hong Kong in August. This is not just any set of cards. Here’s an example of one card I just pulled from the deck.
WHAT WOULD BE POSSIBLE IF … I STOPPED TRYING TO PLEASE EVERYONE?
Here’s another:
WHAT WOULD BE POSSIBLE IF … I TRUSTED THE UNIVERSE AND MYSELF?
I wonder what his answers would be?
***
I knew in my heart when I walked into a church in San Francisco the last week of September and saw his name everywhere around me that I was never going to meet him again. He was already keeping company with God. I made a video and said to his brother: “Please let P know, God is with him!”
I would find out later he got a blood transfusion that day.
I opened the deck of cards exactly one week before he was everywhere. I just started making short videos answering the possibilities on the cards for myself. I wonder if he knows I stole his gift?
***
He died on October 13th, 2018, less than six months from his soul spilling out into mine. He was only seventeen.
I was sitting with Varun in a restaurant when I got the message of his death. I stopped breathing. Varun noticed my eyes well up.
“Are you ok?” he asked. I was clearly not.
Even though it was the first time Varun and I were having coffee, I bravely asked him if he could hold the space for me to talk through what happened, rather than me just balling my eyes out in the middle of a restaurant. Words are my language of love, and I had to tell our story.
Poor Varun! I am sure he was not expecting this on a weekend work coffee. But he was so sweet, allowed me to speak as long as I wished, even walked me home.
I made a video for him back in May.
In the video, I shared this story I am sharing with you about “Her lifeline is short.” I had never shared it with anyone so intimately. I talked to him about us being souls just passing through. I joked with him that I probably only met his brother to actually just meet him.
Given I am much older than both brothers, I explained that we all get different bodies but it is the soul that counts and never dies. I jabbed him that he might be the oldest of the three of us in soul years. I think he would have chuckled at that comment.
I can only talk about these moments since my phone got stolen on a trip to London this summer and all his photos and videos were on that phone.
***
I have asked myself, over and over since he died, how it is possible I can feel so connected to someone I have never even met.
Is it my deep sense of the humanity of every living being and thing? Is it because I witnessed first-hand the rawness of his brother’s pain and mad love for him when he learned about his cancer spreading again? Or is it something else that has, needs, no explanation?
I am not sure. Was it his impending death at such a young age had brought me back to the open wounds I still have from my own childhood—waiting for death to come?
Death did not arrive for me at seventeen, but it did for him. Now he is everywhere.
One day I will meet him on the other side. We will skip the small talk and I can finally have all the soul conversations I am so eager to have with him.
R.I.P. P.
