What legacy are you leaving? What legacy are you helping to create?
There are many ways to leave a legacy, apart from your DNA, for the next generation.
Remember, someone is always watching you and learning from you.
You are a living lesson for someone. The way you talk, the way you act, the way you behave, and the choices you make are all being observed and are all teaching lessons for those watching you and for the next generation. The question is, will you be a living lesson to help make things better or to continue the path of destruction?
"I feel like I'm always learning from people."
Douglas Brinkley
For example, I write and create. I write blogs, podcasts, stories, and books. I try to impart the wisdom, information, and lessons I’ve learned throughout my journey in this life, often the hard way, to the next generation through these books and writings so, hopefully, the reader will not have to repeat the same mistakes or experience the same failures and challenges that I have. I hope you will reach higher heights and help more people than you could or have, and I hope to help you understand that life has meaning, life is valuable, you do matter, and that the truth is real and objective and the best foundation for this life. I also hope to encourage that inquisitive little voice in people to ask questions and do their due diligence in independent research to learn more, understand better, and grow.
Challenges, however, are inevitable and invaluable to our lives. It is through challenge that our endurance grows, the level and roots of our faith are tested, and the opportunities we seek are presented.
Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.
George S. Patton
But we don't have to personally live out and go through every challenge ourselves. We can and do learn through observational learning, which is the process of learning by watching the behaviors of others. And that is a legacy each one of us is building and will leave behind.
I joke sometimes that because I’m a writer and this work is considered artistic, my work has the potential to not be popular or make much income—there won't be a legacy—until after I’m gone, like an artist.
One time when I made this comment, someone heard me and replied, “At least you will have a legacy to leave behind.”
They made that statement as if they truly believed that they would not have a legacy to leave when they were dead and gone from this earth—that they had no legacy at all. There is nothing here and nothing eternal. That is a sad thought.
In reality, you are building a legacy; you will have a legacy; you will leave a legacy; and you will help build an eternal legacy. The question is: What will your legacy be? What will you leave and impart? Will it be helpful and eternally pleasing, or will it be destructive and eternally painful?
Unmarried, childless, and with what this person deemed a dead-end, go-nowhere job, and with no product, book, or teaching created to be read or viewed after they are no longer here among the living, they thought that they had no legacy. To them, they have not left anything behind; they have no legacy.
That begs the question:
If you do not create a work of art, a movie, write a book, or create a teaching lesson, did you leave a legacy behind?
If you believe you have no legacy and that you will not leave one, then did your life make any difference? Did your life matter?
If you have no book, no product, no video, no wealth, no mansion, and no material item to leave behind, did you do anything of value or meaningful with your life?
They are honest questions, are they not?
Even the Bible says in Proverbs 13:22, "A good person leaves an inheritance for their children's children."
Did you leave an inheritance for your children? How about your children's children?
What is an inheritance? It is "something that is inherited," a "valuable possession," or "the acquisition of a trait." An inheritance can be the foundation you help your children build their lives upon, the values they observe you holding dear, the standards by which you live your life, and what or whom you choose to worship. These are all an inheritance you are leaving for your kids; these are all a legacy you leave behind for those who were watching you and will speak of you when you are no longer here on earth.
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