I choose to live until death, not spend the time dying until death occurs.
Interpretation
Live actively and purposefully instead of passively waiting for life to end.
This quote reflects the idea that one should embrace life with intention and awareness rather than merely existing and allowing time to pass. Mattie Stepanek encourages a proactive approach to living fully, highlighting the importance of making the most out of each moment, even in the face of mortality.
In practice
During a motivational speech about overcoming adversity.
If it came to a magic genie, I would ask him for two extra wishes. One would be that no one would have to live with the muscular dystrophy disease or any disease. And the second one would be world peace, that we just stop fighting, talk about things, and we could live in harmony once again, like God intended us to do.
I never question God. Sometimes I say, 'Why me? Why do I have such a hard life? Why do I have this disease? Why do I have siblings who died?' But then I think and say, 'Why not me?'
Life once conceived, must be protected with the utmost care; abortion and infanticide are abominable crimes.
It was up to him to pay back to the world in beauty and caring what Leslie had loaned him in vision and strength.
I feel that my whole life is a contribution.
The birds sang, the proles sang. the Party did not sing. All round the world, in London and New York, in Africa and Brazil, and in the mysterious, forbidden lands beyond the frontiers, in the streets of Paris and Berlin, in the villages of the endless Russian plain, in the bazaars of China and Japan β everywhere stood the same solid unconquerable figure, made monstrous by work and childbearing, toiling from birth to death and still singing.
Life doesn't stop after losing someone, but it goes on without them differently.
Don't lament so much about how your career is going to turn out. You don't have a career. You have a life. Do the work. Keep the faith. Be true blue. You are a writer because you write. Keep writing and quit your bitching. Your book has a birthday. You don't know what it is yet.
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