Having Maddy finish high school 10,000 or so miles away was not how I\u2019d planned it. Nor was a visit to D.C. in late April, when I was already going to be in the U.S. twice in May. The first trip would be to speak at two conferences on each coast and the second to attend her graduation. Fitting in a third trip was, well, just too much, especially as I\u2019m also speaking in China, Australia and New Zealand in May.<\/p>\n
But still, I kept thinking about it.<\/p>\n
I loathed the idea of not seeing the surprise on Maddy\u2019s face when her name was called out at the special Cum Laude ceremony. That was on top of missing seeing perform in her final high school play that was on the same weekend.<\/p>\n
Yet, three trips across the world in five weeks was a lot. Any reasonable person would agree.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Margie-Warrell-Deathbed-2-375x500.png\")
However, this nagging feeling that I\u2019d regret not going the extra mile (or 10,000) just wouldn\u2019t go away.<\/p>\n
Five days before the assembly, I decided to end my rumination, reshuffle all of my commitments and, inconveniencing a few people, book my flight.<\/p>\n
As I write this now, I\u2019m sitting in Beijing airport, waiting to board the final leg of my trip back to Singapore after a wonderful, whirlwind \u2013 but totally worth it \u2013 weekend in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
I will have spent more time in airports and airplanes than I did on the ground. But life is short, and some moments simply cannot be missed.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to the point of this article\u2026<\/p>\n
\u2026the deathbed test.<\/p>\n
The speaker at the Cum Laude ceremony was Alex S. Jones, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author and former student at Maddy\u2019s school. In his speech, he shared how he has learned to use the deathbed test when making big decisions. Like whether, in his mid-twenties, to attend Columbia University\u2019s graduate program in journalism or head off backpacking across the Sahara Desert and traverse the length of Africa. He chose the latter to the disapproval of his parents and bewilderment of almost everyone else.<\/p>\n
His words struck a powerful chord with me (actually, they had tears streaming down my cheeks). Not only because I also backpacked across the Sahara at a similar age, but because they affirmed the decision that had led me to be sitting in the front row of the auditorium after 36 hours of travel to get there.<\/p>\n
So, what is the deathbed test?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s casting yourself into the distant future, imagining yourself lying on your deathbed and asking what your future self would want you to do at the current juncture of your life.<\/p>\n
To stay on the path you\u2019re travelling now \u2013 complete with its comfort, certainty, status and security \u2013 or to take the road less travelled?<\/p>\n
To go with the convenient, \u201cdefault\u201d option, or to dig deeply and to choose the path that feels truly right, despite the hassle and hardship it creates?<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s face it, there will always be many reasons to justify taking the easier path, sticking with the status quo and avoiding the possibility of failure.<\/p>\n
Yet the longer I am alive, the more firmly I believe that living a life that nurtures our souls, and not just a short-term sense of comfort or security, will often require trading comfort for inconvenience, security for uncertainty, and going that extra mile (or 10,000!) when you can easily justify not bothering.<\/p>\n
So what about you? As you think about the big decisions in your life, and perhaps a few of the smaller ones, are you currently on a path that puts you at risk of one day looking back and wondering, perhaps regretfully, \u2018What if I\u2019d tried?\u2019<\/p>\n
Alex S. Jones ended his speech by quoting from one of my favourite poems by Robert Frost. As I listened to him say that it had defined his life, I realized that it may well define mine also.<\/p>\n
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I\u2014 PS: Just a month now until my Live Brave Women\u2019s Weekend<\/a>. Only three spots left so if you want to ensure you never look back and wonder “What if?” or “What else?”, I encourage you to join me<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two weeks ago I got an email from the dean of academics at my daughters\u2019 school notifying me that she was to be inducted into her school\u2019s Cum Laude academic honor society. They looked forward to seeing my husband and me there. Maddy is finishing high school in Washington, D.C. We live in Singapore. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16904,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19,12,14],"tags":[234,738,837,871,1083],"class_list":["post-16903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-parenting","category-blog","category-live-passionately","tag-courage","tag-parenting","tag-relationships","tag-risk-taking","tag-vision"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/margiewarrell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nI took the one less traveled by,
\nAnd that has made all the difference.<\/em><\/p>\n