To the young, life looks very long. To the very old who are looking back, life seems to have passed all too quickly. As I write this, my great, great aunt Virginia Ferguson will turn 99 in a couple of months. Her husband, my great, great uncle Alvie Ferguson, lived to be 95 or 96, as did his sister Hattie Bench. My dad’s mother lived to be 89 and my mother’s parents are beginning their 80’s. I could go on and on about the people I have known or currently know who are well into their eighties and nineties. And as of this writing, the life expectancy of both men and women is continuing to rise in almost all developed countries. 

Even though people are living longer, most of us are wise enough to realize that those years seem to pass very quickly and we never know when our time is done. Our time is measured in moments, weeks, months, years and decades. As time passes, we look back on our lives with regret or satisfaction. All this to say that we must choose how to spend our time very carefully because it passes and is gone in the blink of an eye. There is a song written by Phil Vassar and performed by Tim McGraw that hits home with me. Here are the lyrics:

I think Ill take a moment, celebrate my age
The ending of an era and the turning of a page
Now its time to focus in on where I go from here
Lord have mercy on my next thirty years

Hey my next thirty years Im gonna have some fun
Try to forget about all the crazy things Ive done
Maybe now Ive conquered all my adolescent fears
And Ill do it better in my next thirty years

My next thirty years Im gonna settle all the scores
Cry a little less, laugh a little more
Find a world of happiness without the hate and fear
Figure out just what Im doing here
In my next thirty years

Oh my next thirty years, Im gonna watch my weight
Eat a few more salads and not stay up so late
Drink a little lemonade and not so many beers
Maybe Ill remember my next thirty years

My next thirty years will be the best years of my life
Raise a little family and hang out with my wife
Spend precious moments with the ones that I hold dear
Make up for lost time here, in my next thirty years
In my next thirty years

The song is plain but poignant because a man realizes he needs to be more cognizant of how he spends the next three decades of his life and perhaps make some significant changes. Most of us look back on our life with mixed reviews, some regret and some satisfaction. As this song plays over and over in my head, the same thought comes to mind: my past does NOT dictate my future. With that realization comes a powerful question: Whether I have 3 minutes left or thirty years or more, how will I spend my time? How will you spend yours?