If you’ve read me enough, you have gathered that I am all for taking care of my health. Prevention is better than cure. You may also know I wasn’t always this way.

Schooled in my young adulthood

With youth comes a false sense of invincibility. Life showed me when I hit my thirties that I couldn’t neglect my body and expect it to thrive.I learned my lesson. I started to fix my lifestyle. I changed my diet drastically, started exercising again and turned my health around.

Schooled in my forties

However, it seems that as time goes on and my body keeps ageing, I have to be even more careful. About a month ago, I tripped and fell, stubbed my big toe. No big deal. Then a couple of weeks afterwards, played tennis. The next day my big toe started hurting again. Huh? This and other recent instances make me painfully aware that as I hit 40, I don’t recover as quickly as I used to.

Forward to today: despite all the precautions I take (disclaimer: I’m not perfect, I still have a sweet tooth for example.That’s my final frontier), here am I writing this waiting to see a doctor. I have had a dull pain in my lower abdomen for a few weeks and instead of going away it seems to be getting worse. This is unheard of for me. Edit: It turned out to be a benign thing, fixed with more fiber in my diet. Phew!

Middle age epiphany

Let’s be real. We are all on borrowed time on this earth. Although I don’t believe death ends it all completely, I don’t subscribe to waiting for the next life to be happy. I want to be reasonably happy and make some impact in this life before I go, if I go. That’s one reason why I have been putting parts of me out there everywhere, things that may outlive me.

Granted I am not really content with what I have created so far. I can always do more and better. But hopefully I will leave things behind that are worthy of note, at the very least posthumously.

A personal mission

Setting the morbid aside, the mere process of creating makes me feel alive and happy, whether the result is up to my standards or not. Creating is my jam, whether in the form of writing, songwriting, photography, dancing… One of my personal taglines is “Rudiano is my game, self expression is my game” for this reason.

Whether it’s an extension of yourself or something else, having something you look forward to doing each day is a blessing. Instead of each day slipping by with little zest, you can’t wait to get up and have another crack at it. Having a sense of purpose makes you happier and more resilient. You can overcome more because you have a personal mission to accomplish. What’s yours?

My main creative project right now is releasing a song every month as long as health and finances permit. I’ve started this month. Check it out if you’re curious . You can find me under Rudiano on SoundCloud, Spotify, iTunes and the like. My aim is to eventually come out with at least a masterpiece before I’m done. I have a dozen of candidates.

I aim for my songs to be clean, catchy and beautiful. Let’s see where this journey takes me!

Conclusion

Life is too precious to let it just slip by. Don’t take it for granted. Nurture it, do what you need to do to make it last as long as possible and by all means fill it meaningfully.

Identify what makes you feel happy and alive, make it your personal mission. Don’t go to the grave with regrets.