Living Your Last Day – Some Thoughts
Live each day as if it is your last – these are words that I have thought about more than it would seem necessary. On the face of it, is it unreasonable that living by such a philosophy would be, ultimately, nihilistic.
Consider: there is a society, say, on an island society which is completely cut off from contact with any other civilisation. The island is self sufficient in terms of the basic needs of existence, the society is also sufficiently advanced so the people have access to different kinds of entertainment, music, poetry, food, drink etc. Now, this society is watched over by a capricious god. One day, the god decides that he is going to randomly kill off one inhabitant every day. So, now we actually have a society in which each day could be the last for anyone. What kind of society would that be? It is easy to imagine that the society might give itself up to hedonism, giving up on any long term projects. Basically, they would give up anything with delayed gratification and pursue immediately available pleasure. Of course, the society would also stagnate.
There are examples from history which support this scenario. During the Peloponnesian War – a three decade long civil war between city states in the 5th century BC – during a particularly gruesome stage of the war, the city state of Athens, leader of one side in the war, was ravaged by a plague. Thucydides, a contemporary chronicler of the war, noted with some disgust that the residents gave themselves up to all sorts of immoral behaviour, with the worst of all behaviours being that the gods were no longer honoured.
There is another instance from the history of Ancient Greece which we should consider: the last stand of the 300 Spartans (and their 3000 odd slaves who seem to have been forgotten by popular history). The Spartans made a different choice about how their last day should be lived. But there’s a slight difference here. The Spartans knew it would be their last day, the Athenians lived under the fear that any day could be their last.
If we go back to the statement: live each day as if it is your last; and modify it slightly: live each day as you would your last – now, we have an attitude of ascendant existentialism, instead of nihilism. The question one must ask is not what would you do today if you knew this was your last day alive but how you would like your last alive day to be. I’d assume when a person considers the second question the mind will most probably consider the last day of a life well lived.
When I consider this question, I have to first ask myself, what I’d imagine my ideal life to be like, before I can answer how I would like it to end. Let me attempt an answer.
I want to be a well recognised writer – an author of great novels, books about history, philosophy, art, and maybe a few autobiographies. The last day of that life, I’d imagine, would be spent working on a project, discussing something I’ve written, hope to write with someone I love, who shares my interests, even my life with me.
Now, what would it mean for me to live that ideal last day, today and everyday. The first part is easier. I should be spending most of my day, doing what I hope to have done by my (ideal) last day. The second part is not under my control. I cannot have someone in my life until I do. So, here, maybe it is necessary to make a distinction between the aspects of my life which are the consequences of my actions (writing every day and working on my writing skills, building an intellect capable of thinking great thoughts); opposed to what lies beyond my control. But even with respect to the second aspect, if I’m clear about the kind of person I want in my life, I will actively seek that kind of relationship.
Because – who knows, maybe on that last day I don’t have that person with me, only a memory. Now, instead of living with a memory I live in anticipation – and, consequently, hope. A good day to die.
For Sparta!
