Are you living your Eulogy or Resume?

When that last moment comes and your entire life flashes before your eyes, will you like what you see?

As you move through each day, do you focus more on your resumé and how well you’re proceeding and preparing to proceed further in your career? Or are you focused on what people will say about you after you are finished? The answer is different for every individual, but it’s a valuable question for everyone to ask themselves from time to time. Your answer will probably be some version of “both”!

Walking and Chewing Gum

The second of Stephen R. Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” is to “begin with the end in mind.”

Follow that with “proceed with the end in mind.” How people perceive you in the end is completely a product of your past actions, how and what you do now and in the future. Knowing this impacts the decisions we make regarding how much we can and will do. Perhaps you want to help build houses with Habitat for Humanity or join the Peace Corps. Perhaps you want to volunteer at a local school or hospital.

If you feel overwhelmed by a busy, busy life perhaps you just want to find worthwhile causes to donate money to, such as the classic $19 per month to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, the ASPCA, or my charity VeteransForAzure.org. Several websites provide insight into which charities are most trustworthy, spending less of each dollar on operations, moving benefits to those in need more quickly, and more. These include CharityWatch and CharityNavigator.

Even the most ambitious corporate climber can think about how they can contribute to the greater good while working to add to and advance their resumé. Underlying both thoughts is the question, “where am I headed?” The only difference may be between short-term goals and long.

Context

Your resumé and your eulogy each exist in a different context. The context of your resumé is your plan for your future. You may choose to simply move from job to job, seeking the next one after losing the present one. Or you may have very specific goals in mind for your life’s work and know exactly what learning and working experiences you need to add to your resumé to qualify for that goal opportunity.

The context of your eulogy is more complicated. For one thing, there are two eulogies to think about.

For You: The first is the eulogy you write only for yourself, even if you never write it down. Some use a “bucket list” to guide them through the experiences they want to be sure to have before they “kick the bucket.” Others ask themselves if they have done enough good for enough people, have lived a life of service to others because that was important to them. Have they been a good enough parent, friend, spouse, partner, manager, employee, artist or other? Religious believers in an afterlife may concern themselves with whether they will head upstairs at the end, or down.

In the end, will you have achieved the level of success you seek? Will you have earned the living you always wanted? Will you have enjoyed the recognition within your industry or community that you hoped for? Will you have completed all your plans, or will there be things left undone? Will there be regrets?

For Others: Then there’s the eulogy that someone may write and then read at your funeral. Will they have plentiful great things to say about you, or resort to simple empty platitudes?

Many odd questions may arise when you think about your own funeral. How many cars will be in the processional? How many people will be at your services, at your gravesite? Will all members of your immediate family be in attendance? Will someone who knew you speak of all the wonderful things you did for them, for others, for your community, or will some rented official speak some words taken from a questionnaire they used to interview your family members?

Finally, there’s the unspoken eulogy that is written in the minds of everyone whose lives you touched, and perhaps in history books. Did you leave most or all people feeling sad and grieving for you, or did you leave them indifferent?

Personalizing all of this, do you have your own personal tagline? Words you live by? Your own version of St. Francis’ prayer to be granted the serenity to accept the things you cannot change, the strength to change the things you can, and the wisdom to know the difference? Your tagline can come in handy when you feel you may be losing your way.

You may find it elevating and energizing to come up with your own tagline. Here’s a wonderful place to start by returning to Dr. Covey, whose own personal watchwords were: “To live, to love, to learn, and to leave a legacy.” Begin by asking yourself, are you living or merely getting by? Are you loving and being loved enough? Are you constantly learning more? And what do you want your legacy to be?