On Life, Death, and Coping with Grief

Sneak Peek:

Kristin:    00:00:00    The past is set. The past is written. You shouldn't live in the past. But sometimes looking back for patterns or clues in your family tree can help you move forward or justify a decision that you're making in your present or understand better why you have the ideas and the desires that you do 'cause they're probably coming from somewhere. 

Introduction: Welcome to Badass Digital Nomads, where we're pushing the boundaries of remote work and travel, all while staying grounded with a little bit of old school philosophy, self-development, and business advice from our guests.

Kristin:    00:00:50    Hi everyone. I'm your host Kristin from Traveling with Kristin. And today we're talking about life in the context of death. Now, why would I talk about a topic so morbid as death on a remote work, entrepreneurship and travel podcast? Well, at its core, this podcast is about how to live a good life, a good life on your terms as you would like it to be. A life that you envision for yourself as the highest expression of what your life can be. How you know it can be deep down. And what I've realized in my own life is that there's really no separation between your work, your passions, your hobbies, your interests, and really even your personal life. You know, each element as it were, and the different buckets of life make up this holistic life experience. And this experience is intertwined as an extension of your identity, your personality, and especially your actions, right?  

Kristin:    00:02:17    The actions that you take and don't take your decisions that dictates how your life will unfold mixed with fate, <laugh>, right? Mixed with chance, mixed with the unknown, mixed with the uncontrollable external. And so especially in this time of technology and progress that we are so fortunate to be living in right now, life, it's this fluidity where things aren't necessarily in balance, but everything is happening at the same time. Of course, there are some universal principles that are balanced. You have the sun and the moon, the light and the dark, high tide and low tide, good and bad, right and wrong. And along those lines, there is no life without death. It's something natural. It's a lot of nature. And both dying and grieving the death of others as well as supporting others who are suffering and grieving themselves. These are universal things that unite us as a human race.  

Kristin:    00:03:32    These are unavoidable experiences and so we shouldn't ignore them or fear them, but embrace them, try to understand them, try to help each other go through them. And furthermore, throughout human history, we've always looked to our elders for advice on how to live and for answers. Because those who are older than us have a perspective that we don't necessarily have yet. And so asking our elders questions, especially existential questions, can allow us to essentially pierce the veil of time and get advice from our future that can help us cope or understand better our present. And so we look back on history, we looked to the history books, we looked to the people who came before us, and we looked to the people who came before us who are still alive in this time. And then of course, when those people transition, it's also a time of reflection, of pause, of learning, and of hopefully integrating those lessons that they have taught us.  

Kristin:    00:04:58    Coincidentally, a few months ago I started thinking about having my grandmother on the podcast, my only living grandparent. She was 93 and a half years old at the time, and had been working since she was only 14 years old, although she also retired early. But she spent most of her career working in the travel industry, working for Pan Am Airlines in Miami, where I'm interestingly living now just a few minutes away from her old house. And so I wanted her to come on the show because it is a travel podcast and it's also about business, right? So I wanted her to tell her travel stories and what it was like working for Pan Am in the heyday golden years of flight, like in the 1950s and sixties and seventies and into the eighties, up until right before Pan Am declared bankruptcy. But unfortunately it didn't work out.  

Kristin:    00:06:02    I actually asked her to come on. I brought my microphones to her house, which was five hours away from where I was living in Miami. And it just didn't work out. She was too tired or like too shy or she just wasn't feeling it and I didn't wanna force her to do it. But it's weird that I had that thought because that was two or three months ago. I think it was two months ago, it was like September 8th that I was at her house. And this is November 14th, so I didn't push it. But last weekend on November 7th, she passed away unexpectedly. We actually joked that she would live to be 110 because she had so much energy and she still lived by herself. And um, yeah, so she's no longer with us. And so we won't have her little Italian old lady voice on the podcast today.  

Kristin:    00:07:07    But you will get her lessons or the ones that I'm cherry picking for you channeled through me. And not just the rose colored version either because I wanna share with you what I think she would've told you or some of that. But also what I've learned in her passing and what I've gleaned and interpreted from her, whether she likes it or not, about what to do and how to live, but also what not to do and how not to live, right? Or, or we see what people do and then maybe we make a decision to do the opposite. Because when people die, we sometimes have a tendency to excuse or overlook their flaws and elevate their attributes. But it's important to remember that humans are flawed by design <laugh>. It's how we were made. Everyone's flawed. And so we can learn just as much from people about what we shouldn't do as much about maybe what we should do.  

Kristin:    00:08:16    And so I don't want you to think that just because my grandma died that she was perfect or that she had all the answers. Again, none of us do. But there are important lessons there, especially when you're on this planet for almost a century. And her older sister who I've met is still alive and she's 100 years old. So there are important lessons there that we can learn from. But I used to joke that my grandma's love language was yelling at us <laugh> because she was Italian after all. So even though she was my precious grandma and I love her dearly, she wasn't perfect. You know, she was rough around the edges, completely coincidentally or synchronistically depending on how you wanna see it. I listened to an episode of the Daily Stoic podcast this morning as I was on my way to the beach to go surfing and it was with Matthew McConaughey.  

Kristin:    00:09:14    So Ryan Holiday, Matthew McConaughey, amazing episode. I'm gonna re-listen to it, so I'll link to it in the show notes. But one of the things that they were talking about in the interview was how much society hates hypocrisy. We have this major distaste for the do as I say, not as I do kind of attitude, but they pointed out that even if someone doesn't always follow their own advice, if it's good sound advice, it doesn't all of a sudden make it wrong. And what many of you have told me that you like about the podcast is the balance between my optimistic, yet realistic take on the world. And I clearly have a positive bias, but also grounded in reality and hopefully always focusing on what we can learn from the purportedly negative things or difficult things that happen in life. But how you can take action and apply different stories and teachings and experiences and insights to your own life.  

Kristin:    00:10:29    And many of you also know that I do reference stoic teachings a lot in my content like this Daily stoic podcast because first and foremost philosophy is timeless. I even reference philosophy in the intro to the podcast because this is like a timeless thing that you can look to for advice at any phase of life. But also with stoicism specifically, the central theme of stoicism is how to live the good life. And that's what we're all here to do. But the stoics we're able to accomplish that feat in an admirably grounded way, although they also constantly had to check themselves and check each other to help themselves and their friends stay on track. And that's why we have so many letters from them. You have Seneca's letters from a stoic, uh, because they could only communicate through writing a lot of the time, but writing was a way to pump themselves up, but also to help each other stay the course.  

Kristin:    00:11:39    And I like to think that content is a form of that these days, whether it's video or podcasts or writing, we are, when we create something, we're telling it to ourselves, but we're also sharing it with others. And so the stoics aspired to live the good life. They didn't always get there, but they tried their best. And we can do that too. And we can take lessons from them in, in seeing things for what they are rather than what we want them to be. Always remembering to distinguish between what we can and can't control, which is something I talked about a few episodes back on the, the skills that you need to become a digital nomad, always keeping that in mind. We can't control everything, but we should be acutely aware of what we can control and also how we're responding to things, especially in our external environment, because what is around us is always changing, it's always fleeting, and in some cases it's not really real.  

Kristin:    00:12:53    So if any of you have read Meditations, which is the Journal of Marcus Aurelius, the stoic philosopher and former emperor of Rome, he opens his journal with a list of people that he's grateful to for the lessons that he's learned from them. So in this podcast, I wanted to share some of those things that I learned from not just my grandma, but my grandparents, and the hopes that you can learn from it too, or that it could inspire you to take some of the lessons from your own family members, whether they are with you in the present or were in the past. And just help motivate all of us, strengthen numbers to make the most of the time that we have left, because life is short. So I'll also share some of my favorite stoic quotes on death. And at the end I'm gonna give you four questions to ponder while listening to a song that I really love.  

Kristin:    00:13:55    I hope I can play it on the podcast. I'll have to check with a copyright, but a song that I find very contemplative in moving. But before continuing with today's solo cast, I just wanna say thank you so, so much, uh, from the depths of my heart to everyone for all of the kind and heartfelt comments and messages that you've sent me over the past week since I announced I was gonna be offline for a little while to grieve and mourn my grandmother and also be with family and everything that goes along with that, um, during this tough time. So I'm really appreciative and thankful of all of your kindness and support and um, it feels weird to be offline for even a week, but I know it's an important part of the healing process. And, um, I'll get back with you soon if you sent me a message so onto the lessons.  

Kristin:    00:14:57    But first, some backstory for context. So I was personally fortunate to be able to grow up with all four of my grandparents. We lived in the same state, at least in Florida, and sometimes in the same city for much of my childhood. And I know that that's not the case for many people, uh, because growing up I know that I had friends that never met their grandparents or even friends who were adopted and never met their biological parents, one of the many injustices in life. So I was definitely aware of how fortunate I was to have that bond with my grandparents, but then I also had this wanderlust, right? And so when I went to college at 18 and then studied abroad a couple years later, I saw all of my family members much less. But at the time, I was just mesmerized by the adventure of traveling abroad.  

Kristin:    00:15:59    And so I didn't really think about it that much until about, well, 2008. So between like six years later, that's when my first grandparent passed away. So that was my dad's dad, my paternal grandfather. And I remember exactly where I was when I got that call. And that's how I remember the year because I know I was living in Nicaragua. I was driving down the road from Managua to Grand Pacifica Resort on the central coast of Nicaragua. And I got the phone call on my first generation iPhone and I just instantly started tearing up. And I remember I had to pull over to keep from wrecking the car. And the first thing I felt obviously was sadness and grief, that my granddad was gone. You know, that reality of losing someone I loved sunk in. And it was for the first time, like we had put my dog to sleep before, but I had never to date lost a family member that was so close to me.  

Kristin:    00:17:13    So there was that sadness there, but then right behind it insidiously, there was guilt, guilt that I wasn't there, that I was thousands of miles away in central America and I thought I should be there. I should have called more, I should have visited more, I should have sent more postcards. You know this, all this tidal wave of thoughts that flood your consciousness when you get that kind of news. And I know that many of you can relate to that. And you know, we shouldn't feel guilty for living our lives the way that we want to. It's perfectly normal to leave home when you turn a certain age, when you become an adult, you move away for school, you move away for work. And that's just the world that we live in today. And so we shouldn't feel guilty for not being there all the time because you've gotta find that balance between being there for your family, but also living life for yourself.  

Kristin:    00:18:29    And what has helped me reconcile this is remembering that you know, your parents, your grandparents, your great-grandparents, someone along the line had your best interests in mind. Your relatives may have immigrated from another country to give you a better life and more opportunities they may have taken on a second job or put away money for you to go to school or hired a tutor or taken out loans or move to a different school district or any number of things to provide a better life for their children. Or maybe you have done that for your children. And so this is to say that our elders, whether they were alive or dead, all made decisions or sacrifices somewhere along the road so that you could be here today and they didn't do it so that you would feel guilty when they died, regardless of how they were at the end.  

Kristin:    00:19:31    Because I know that many people have to deal with things like dementia and Alzheimer's, and sometimes in the last days, your loved ones are not, they do not appear to be the same people that you knew them as before. And my grandma did have a touch of dementia, so that was tough too. But the important thing to remember is that you are unique. You're a miracle of nature. There's no one else like you. And I even researched, I was like, what, how many genes are in the genome? Or you know, I was like, I need to go back to the science behind this. And I found that the average human body is comprised of 7 billion, billion atoms. And I'm quoting, this is an irreparable combination of genes. So your personality and your identity and your inner most hopes and dreams are made up of an irreparable combination.  

Kristin:    00:20:37    And in your DNA, and that is partly from, or mostly from a lineage of people who came before you, who you never met. So who and where you are today is influenced by the legacy of the people that came before you. And we have to assume that regardless of people's flaws or issues or shortcomings or failings, that those who came before you would want the best for you. And that means living out your life's purpose because that is a benefit not just to yourself, but to your family and to society at large. So the first lesson I learned in death is not to feel guilty. There's always gonna be things that you wish you did or didn't do, or wish you said or wish you didn't say. But all of that goes away because not everything has to be explicitly said before someone's passing. That unconditional love is always there and family might be the most important thing in life, but it's not the only thing.  

Kristin:    00:21:51    So sometimes your family members need you and sometimes it's justified and sometimes it's not. And sometimes you can help them and sometimes you can't. But you don't have to become a martyr and you don't have to be available 24/7 and you don't have to live with your grandparents just to spend time with them and not travel because that's what you think is expected of you. Like nobody would, would demand that. So just use your judgment when you're putting others' needs before your own. One of the things that Matthew McConaughey said in this podcast with Ryan Holiday that stuck out to me is that life is a paradox. And he said, the most selfish decision is also the most selfless decision. What <laugh>? I was like, wait, let me re, I actually replayed that. So let's rewind. The most selfish decision is also the most selfless decision. So a lot of times we don't do things because we think they're selfish, but what if the selfish thing was the selfless thing?  

Kristin:    00:23:13    What if you did have to put your oxygen mask on first before helping your loved ones? So you have to draw the line somewhere. And there's definitely, like, I might've felt guilty for not being there when my first three grandparents died, but now I'm realizing that that was okay. And there were times, you know, let's look at both sides of the coin. There were times this year that my mom, my mom has been the full-time caregiver of my grandma, of her mom. And there were times that our family had an intervention. 'cause we were like, we need to change something about this situation because we were afraid that my grandma would outlive my mom. We were like, don't sacrifice yourself and your health for my grandma. That's not fair. That's not the way it should be. And that's not ultimately what my grandmother wanted. But that's the path that we were going down.  

Kristin:    00:24:25    And so we did have legitimate concerns that my mom couldn't do it. So we had to hire another full-time caregiver to help out. So that's, you know, that's, that's a scary thought to think that you could die or your loved one could die, helping another loved one just out of wearing themselves down or stress. So that was another lesson that I got out of this. So the moral is if there's a decision or a problem or a situation in your life that you're struggling with, maybe you feel guilty about quitting your job or changing jobs or moving somewhere that other people don't approve of or don't want you to go to or leaving the country or traveling. Maybe Matt's words can help Matt as if we're on a first name basis. Matthew McConaughey's words can help. The most selfish decision is also the most selfless decision.  

Kristin:    00:25:28    So thinking back to where we are today and the struggles of the people who came before us in 2020 here, just thinking back a little bit, um, my mom's parents immigrated from Europe to the US after World War I in search of peace and a better life. My great-grandfather fought in the trenches in World War I actually both great-grandfathers. My dad's grandfather was gassed and my mom's grandfather almost lost an arm. So he was shot in the arm and they wanted to amputate it, but he begged and begged and begged for them to save his arm. And ultimately they did not amputate it. But as soon as he could, he left <laugh> because he did not wanna experience that again. So he brought his family from Hungary, Romania, to the US through France and you know, he didn't wanna subject his his son to having to go to war, which my grandfather would've had to go to war in World War 2.  

Kristin:    00:26:43    And who knows if I would be here if that would've happened. So these decisions that our ancestors made have like a direct impact on our life experience today. And interestingly, instead of giving my grandfather a gun right to go to war, he gave him a violin. And my grandfather was apparently so gifted at playing this instrument that instead of it saying child or minor on the ship record on their immigration form, it said Prodigy. And I don't know who wrote that in, I think it was, I guess whoever wrote it for the entire list of passengers. Um, but yeah, instead of being becoming a soldier and potentially dying in World War 2, he became a musical prodigy. But life is weird and sometimes you don't wanna do what you're good at or there are external factors, either real or perceived that can prevent you from pursuing your dreams or fully expressing yourself.  

Kristin:    00:27:57    Maybe there's religious or governmental restraints depending on where you live and those kinds of things can be really hard to overcome. But one of the lessons I learned from my grandfather's experience, and he died at 90, is just to do what makes you happy. Because he was a, a violin prodigy who got into Julliard but didn't care <laugh>, he actually loved trains and planes and engineering. So he gave up his violin, literally put it in the box under his bed and became a pilot instead. And who can say if that's right or wrong? And so I think back to the pressure he must have felt from his parents to pursue music because they immigrated from Europe to the US so that he could have a freedom and a better life and not have to go to war. And he didn't want to play that instrument.  

Kristin:    00:29:03    He wanted to fly airplanes. And so these are the decisions that, you know, who can say if it's right or wrong. But that's, that's what I learned from him is that you don't have to necessarily do what you're good at, you can do what you like. Maybe he withheld that gift from the world, but that was his decision. And likewise, my grandmother's family also immigrated from Europe, but from Sicily and she was the first of four kids to be born in the US and her father probably worked too much. So he was a workaholic in Ohio and Cleveland who acquired a lot of wealth and a lot of property. But at the expense of his family, he ended up getting divorced and remarried and had a very strained relationship with my grandmother, I think because she was the youngest. So she actually ended up moving out of the house at one point and living with family friends. I don't know all the details around that. But anyway, in a crazy turn of events, my great-grandfather was murdered. He was killed by a hit and run and his second wife and her alleged Mafia family were the main suspects. And they also conveniently acquired all of his assets after he passed away. So that was my grandma's inheritance. So things are messy guys, but that is such a crazy story to be killed in a hit and run and have all of your assets stolen.  

Kristin:    00:30:50    But so many years later, the lesson as I perceive it, is the way that Marcus Aurelius so aptly puts it in meditations. He says, you may leave this life at any moment, have this possibility in your mind in all that you do or say or think. He also says, don't behave as if you are destined to live forever. Death hangs over you while you live, while it is in your power. Be good. Now, the cliche here is that you could get hit by a bus tomorrow and that is a real thing and people always say it, but it's true. So after that tragedy, my grandparents moved to Miami for warmer weather and to just start a new life. My grandma, I think I used to always tell her she was born before her time, that she was meant to be born in the nineties or something because she rejected the traditional role of being a housewife.  

Kristin:    00:31:53    Think back in the 1950s. My mom was born, my parents were born in the early fifties. So she rejected that role, didn't wanna be a housewife, wanted to be a professional, wanted to be a businesswoman, got a job with Pan Am. She didn't care what anyone thought. She just wanted to go to work, work her nine to five or eight to five. She basically was an Italian grandma who didn't cook. And my grandfather's mom, my great-grandmother basically raised my mom and her brother. So growing up, whenever I didn't like the rules that my parents gave me, I would go to my grandma for advice because she was so liberal, so progressive and so untraditional. And she was the one who encouraged me to study abroad in college when my parents told me not to because they were afraid I was gonna get kidnapped or something bad was gonna happen to me as I was only, I was 20 years old when I went to Costa Rica the first time by myself.  

Kristin:    00:33:01    Um, but my grandma also supported my decision to move back to Costa Rica after college and take a risk and live there rather than taking a safe, secure corporate job back in Orlando, Florida. And so she always secretly told me that I could do anything and to travel as much as I could. And so I listened to her, um, sometimes over the advice of my parents and my grandparents did love to travel. They both, you know, worked in the airline industry and they would even take the train, I guess maybe because they were European. They would take the Amtrak train from Florida to California and back just for fun, <laugh>. Or they would like fly first class to Paris to eat dinner and then fly back to Miami because they could fly for free with Pan Am. And that was back when um, first class was super luxurious and you could, you could still smoke on airplanes back then.  

Kristin:    00:34:04    And my grandma was a smoker. She actually quit cold Turkey, so she was really stubborn <laugh>, she smoked like a pack or so a day, was it three packs a day, something, some crazy amount of cigarettes. And then she had a, uh, emphysema and she quit cold Turkey the same day she found out she had a touch of emphysema and she never had a health problem from it again. But anyway, so that was back when you can smoke on airplanes. And she also told me that the airline used to give every first class passenger a bottle of cognac as a thank you gift as you are deplaning. So they're like, oh, goodbye. You know, have a good trip. Here's a bottle of cognac. I thought that was random. We also still have some of those first class menus. They're like in mint condition and they had some good food back then.  

Kristin:    00:34:56    But anyway, um, the lesson in all of that I think is to just unapologetically be yourself regardless of what your family thinks or what society's expectations are. My grandparents certainly did and people thought they were weird. But one thing that is kind of the downside of that is that I think that my grandparents put too many plans for after retirement because they basically stopped traveling when they retired. So I don't know if they ran out of energy or what happened, but they followed all the rules of life, you know, save money, retire, then go travel. And they really didn't travel that much after they retired, even though they could fly anywhere in the world for free. So I've always been cognizant of that. I'm like, God, why did they, why did they stop traveling? You know, that was like their time to go out and travel.  

Kristin:    00:35:59    So don't leave everything until retirement because you might just be tired and not wanna travel. So try to, you know, live for today. The other weird thing I noticed about them is that they always thought that they were too busy, somehow too busy to travel. And I was like, how could you be too busy in retirement? But I think that busyness is a disease and I feel too busy sometimes. I look at my mom and I see that she's too busy and sometimes I look at passive income entrepreneurs or my retired neighbors down the street and they just look so relaxed. And I'm like, what is that like? And I realized that we put things on our own plate, we can fill up our plate how we want. And so I look at my life and I'm like, how do I feel so busy? Because I have, you know, YouTube channel and a podcast and a company and writing and all these things that I like to do, but I'm the one making myself busy.  

Kristin:    00:37:04    And then I look at people with like three kids and a dog and I'm like, they're busy. I don't even have kids so everyone's busy. But let's keep that busyness in check so that we're not too busy to live our lives. But call me sentimental. But maybe, I don't know, I've always been kind of like the historian of the family. I've always been researching my family tree and I think that this curiosity about my grandparents' lives and their origins even more than theirs, like they didn't know why I cared so much to learn about my ancestry, but this curiosity is one of the drivers for me to travel. And that is what led me to spend so much time in Europe to learn more about the conditions that prompted my family members to flee back after World War I. And just to learn more in general about where I was from.  

Kristin:    00:38:03    I think that helped me understand where I might be going in life. That was a way for me to find answers. So if you feel confused in life and are wondering about what to do or where to go or even who you are, it always helps to look back first at what you liked to do in childhood before you became an adult and you maybe were told no, or your dreams were dampened a bit by the realities of adulthood. But also tracing back your ancestry to see what you find. This can be a really good way to get to know yourself in a new way. For example, the only reason I know about my grandfather's viol skills is because I found his actual immigration record on ancestry.com. So now after having uncovered that a few years ago, my interest in electronic music makes a lot more sense.  

Kristin:    00:39:10    And the context of knowing that that musical gene is buried in my DNA somewhere probably because of my grandpa and my sister randomly got her pilot's license. And maybe that was inspired by my grandfather being a pilot. So the past is set, the past is written. You shouldn't live in the past. But sometimes looking back for patterns or clues in your family tree can help you move forward or justify a decision that you're making in your present or understand better why you have the ideas and the desires that you do 'cause they're probably coming from somewhere. Another thing to think about is, you know, I know that all of you have been through the experience of losing someone that you love, but I find comfort in remembering that each person who passes away is passing on the torch to the next generation. So I interpret that as basically having a ticket to do what I wanna do.  

Kristin:    00:40:23    Like not being self-conscious or afraid of my ideas and my dreams, but having that certainty that they're coming from somewhere. They're coming from somewhere deeply embedded in my DNA or whatever. And you know, life is short. You probably have a hundred years or less to make the most of this life. So you should do the things that you think you should do. You should do the things that make you happy and you should do the things that you perceive are going to make an impact in the world, whatever they are. And it doesn't matter if no one else gets it, as long as you get it. And I uncovered this commencement speech by Steve Jobs where he describes death as life's change agent. He says, your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people's thinking.  

Kristin:    00:41:29    Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. Think about that. Steve Jobs is saying to have the courage to follow your heart and intuition, which seems contrary to logic and science and technology and engineering. But he's saying that your heart and intuition already know what you want to become. Everything else is just noise. His speech also reminds me of a quote by Seneca. Seneca was this stoic philosopher, but he was also a polymath. He was a writer, he was a political advisor, he was a speaker, he was a politician in his own right, he was a playwright. And he wrote, let us prepare our minds as if we'd come to the very end of life. Let us postpone nothing. Let us balance life's books each day. The one who puts the finishing touches on their life each day is never short of time.  

Kristin:    00:42:46    Time is malleable. Does time even exist? You know, so let us postpone nothing. I love looking to the stoics for insight on this because they were really practical on their outlook on death. On on the Daily Stoics website, they have an article on death and grief that I was reading to, you know, make myself feel better. And in that article, and I'll link to that in the show notes, it says, the stoics wanted to conquer their fear of death, use death productively, and even see it objectively as a natural event that we all will face. We tend to fear our own deaths, but also those of the people we love. So how do we cope with this by facing facts but also with compassion. So this is me, not the daily stoic this, this is my opinion. Another coincidence or synchronicity this week in my Daily Stoic journal, which I have not picked up in like a year.  

Kristin:    00:43:56    So I had it last year and then I found it and I wanted to read it. And I realized that I had left the whole month of November open. So I started filling it in again. And coincidentally in this week it was talking about how to practice letting go. And it says in there, we suffer when we lose things we love and we suffer most when we lose people. We love a natural and unavoidable part of life. Death is painful. No one denies that. Even the stoics, even Seneca, who is a bit sarcastic and can sometimes be cold in how he talks and writes about death, like very straightforward. But he also wrote quote, who maintains that this is not a heavy blow, but it is part of being human. And the Daily Stoic continues in that passage. It says, our suffering is increased by our belief that we possess the objects of our love, that they are, as we like to say, a part of us.  

Kristin:    00:45:09    But this belief is actually quote, a form of clinging that ignores the simple fact that we don't control what will happen, not to our own bodies, let alone the ones we love. End quote. So a practice that you can do to embody this sentiment, this reality is to look at your loved ones as precious, fragile, breakable glass, to just cultivate a sense of appreciation for the time that you've had together in a humility for when that time might be up. So not to take them for granted. Think of holding this like precious breakable glass or even, um, what are those called? Where the sand is running through the glass, like running out of time.  

Kristin:    00:46:04    Everyone's time comes to an end. Epictetus said, I cannot escape death, but at least I can escape the fear of it. He also said, your precious one isn't one of your possessions, but something given for now, not forever to go a little bit deeper. As I mentioned, I have four questions from last week's Daily Stoic journal again, which coincided with the exact days of my grandmother's passing and the days after it. And the first one is, what is your role in the play of life? And you can pause and answer it or you can come back to this timestamp and do it if you're driving or something, do it later. So number one, what is your role in the play of life? Number two, are you prepared for the randomness of fate and luck?  

Kristin:    00:47:09    Number three, what principles will help steer you through the flow of change? That's a good one. And number four, what will remain when all else passes away? Some thoughts to ponder. But in conclusion, through these experiences of losing our loved ones, I've really learned that it's important to slow down. It's important to slow down so that you don't miss life. And so that you don't take those people for granted. No one wants to get that call. It's the worst. Family comes first. We know this. But also health and wellbeing come first. Steve Jobs didn't know when he gave that commencement speech that he only had six years left to live here. He was speaking on the shortness and the urgency of life and how to live it. And his life was almost over. I mean, that just gives me chills. So slow down. And also, let's keep the big picture in mind.  

Kristin:    00:48:30    Why are you working so hard? Are you working on the right things? Are you spending your time in the right way? Are you getting enough sleep? Are you eating healthy? Are you taking care of your body? Are you walking? Are exercising every day? Are you treating yourself right? Are you treating others right? What are you doing? <laugh>? Sometimes we need to pause and just remember what we're doing here. Epictetus, another stoic said, the strength that is yours, quote is not your reputation, money, or position, but in your judgments about the things you control and don't control for this alone is what makes us free and unfettered, end quote. And my third big takeaway is you can't do everything alone. You can't go through life alone. You can't deal with grief alone. You need support from friends and family. In tough times. We all do. Sometimes you need to ask for help.  

Kristin:    00:49:38    You need to lean on them. You need to just cry. You need to just, ugh, just be and just do nothing. And just try to make it through that day. And then you'll be there for other people when they're going through those times. We're all in this together. It's an ebb and a flow. Sometimes you give, sometimes you take, sometimes you receive. So if you're suffering from the recent lost of a loved one family member or not, whenever you're listening to this at any point in time in the future, just know that my thoughts are with you, my empathy and compassion are with you. And remember that it's a natural process.  

Kristin:    00:50:24    Humans are flawed. Humans are imperfect, but not to feel guilty and not to have regrets. And to remember that not everything has to be said explicitly. And in the time that they are on the planet, if they have passed, they are at peace. You can still communicate with them, you can still talk to them, you can still ask forgiveness. You can still say, I love you as many times as you need to. They will hear you. And I hope that these quotes and these stories and this context can help comfort you if you're experiencing grief, but also help motivate you to live your life to the fullest at any stage regardless of your age. And I was searching, 'cause I remember writing a medium article last year or two years ago. I think it might've in 2018. It was about the 11 life lessons I've learned in 15 years of being a digital nomad.  

Kristin:    00:51:29    And number 10, well, they were in no particular order, but number 10 says, you shouldn't wait to start living. Life can change in an instant. It can, and it does. There's no reason to postpone your best life, try to take tiny steps or make marginal improvements in your life every day. You don't have to have it all figured out. You just have to know what to do next. If there's one final thought I can leave you with, it's to please take care of yourself. Remember, life is short. I'm wishing you good health and sending you my very best vibes. I wanna thank you again for all of your kind comments and messages of support during this tough time for me. I'm so glad I didn't cry, <laugh>, I think I cried enough in the past week. Um, I crazily was going to try to record this podcast like the day after my grandma passed.  

Kristin:    00:52:32    And I'm so glad that I waited to let things integrate more. Unfortunately, I can't play the song that I wanted to due to copyright restrictions, but I will link to it in the show notes if you'd like to listen to it. And it is called Burgs by Mt. Wolf, B-U-R-G-S, by Mount Mt. Wolf, WOLF. And I'll just read a couple of the lyrics that resonated with me and you can, uh, listen. On Spotify, it says, it doesn't actually take very much to make the deepest part of us incredibly happy. You know, just be here just to appreciate, appreciate being here, to feel that you are alive, to be in touch with your heart. That's it. And then it continues that the invitation is to see how much you can notice what you're already a part of and appreciate it and share it and care about those that are around and count for their welfare while you are looking out for your own.  

Kristin:    00:54:00    That's it. And then you'll get to the end of it, having had an awesome time knowing that it's something you'd recommend to others. And it says, you came here with a sense of wonder and somehow the wonder of it wasn't enough. And we stopped wondering and started to wonder about ourselves. And then you're wondering about yourself. You forgot what you came here for, what you came to be a part of. A couple hours before my grandma passed, we called her older sister in Detroit, even though my grandma wasn't, she couldn't talk. She could hear, and she hadn't seen her sister in decades. And to hear the love that came through on the phone through her sister's voice, thousands of miles away, it was like that eternal bond and that infinite love that is everlasting. And it was so special to hear Nell's voice at a hundred years old expressing that unconditional love for her baby sister. So wherever you are in the world, even if you're traveling, even if you're separated from your loved ones, don't worry because you can't break that bond. And that bond is is always there through life and death and the afterlife.  

Kristin:    00:55:53    Thank you so much for listening. And remember to leave a review for the podcast wherever you listen and share this episode with someone you think it might help.  

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