Last year, I paused. Everything around me just stopped. My entire life slowed down as I watched one fragile truck fly and twist---in air---along the freeway, tumbling like a toy car against the road---pounding like a hammer against the hot, black pavement. It wasn't the truck that made me freeze up and tremble; it was the human life inside of it. The real life of one fragile person....
Breathe. Take in the smooth air through your wide nostrils and smell the spice of your home, the outdoors, or wherever you are. Hold that moment. Now exhale. Feel your chest and shoulders fall and the warmth of your breath fade into the twirling dust of the air. Hold that moment while pressing your eyelids softly together in your own silence. Then breath again.
You're ALIVE.
Appreciation for life often fades like the warm breath of our exhales. We lose it, and forget to find it again. We forget to see all the good that comes from living and then we forget who we are and what we live for. Often, we forget to truly LIVE until something flashes before us---like God is trying to wake us up from a heavy slumber. It is like God is shaking us into reality.
God did that to me.
....After witnessing the heart-wrenching, eye-opening car wreck, I sat motionless in the car as my dad pulled us swiftly to the side of the freeway, where we dialed "9-1-1". I was numb. I was completely silenced, though my heart still thumped wildly in my chest. While my dad spoke to the emergency center (or whatever you call it), my mom and I, with tears in our eyes, mouthed aloud a simple prayer for the man in the truck. Our enfolding hands where cold around each other as we begged God to help that man. I didn't really know why I kept crying, but I did.
It might have been that I couldn't help thinking about him. In one second--- in more than fifteen flips down the freeway--- his life could have been taken and his spirit lifted up to the warm embrace of heaven. I thought about his family. What if he had children or a wife? Did he leave them with a sweet goodbye? While tense, but shaking and chattering in shock, I ultimately thought about how he lived his life. Would he be proud in heaven as he stood before the Savior? Or would heaven be a surprise to him as if he had never imagined the truth of it before? I didn't know.
My message is that I hope you seek to live. I hope this is a wake up call for YOU to really live your life. Either start, or resume. If you only had one more day to live--- if you were to die tomorrow--- how would you want to have left your mark or your footprint in the sand? What would you want your loved ones to remember you by and what would you have wanted to tell them? This is deeply important. Of course you won't pass away tomorrow (and don't try), but I want to challenge you to lift your voices and be grateful that you're alive. A lifetime is a small second in eternity, but it is truly important. And that is why you should live it as if everyday were your last!
You're Alive! Isn't that special?
Hope this inspired you!
Makenzie Monson <3
*we never found out what really happened to the man in the vehicle, but we hope he and his family were richly comforted no matter the circumstance through the prayer we offered in our car*
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