“Oh hindsight, I love you. Especially one time recently, as he only took a few days to do his work. Historically it has taken months to years and a lot of addictive behavior for me to recognize this love in my life. I have quite often experienced his wisdom as shame, instead of mentor, so I definitely tried to drown him out. Nah, I did not completely ignore my weaknesses in the past. I felt their haunting presence, a drum beat of, “Why bother, that stuff never works out when you try it.” So, I reframed the idea of my...

One of the translations of the title phrase is “Keep death always before you so that you remember to live.” It brings to mind my favorite William Wallace line, “All men die, not all men really live.” In fact, many, many writers have encouraged being mindful of the brevity of life in some way, which by definition must include the finality of it. The recent Ash Wednesday is a Catholic observation of the reality of death, “Remember man that you are dust, and to dust you will return.” (Genesis 3:19) I remember that as a young Mom the scariest thing...