What Do You Want To Be Known For?

I think that this is the big question in life.  "What do you want to be known for?"  Another way to think about it is: "When you are gone, what do you want to be remembered for?"  There are a myriad of labels or adjectives that can be applied to people to begin to brainstorm an answer for yourself.  And despite those that scream that they aren't a label...in the end, we are boiled down to what we were in our lives and who people saw us as.  Gay, straight, black, white, conservative, liberal, wild, meek.  The life we lead follows us to the grave, and if done right, beyond the grave.

When my mother died, it was standing room only at her funeral.  Some people were there because they were her family.  Some people were there because they had worked with her or wanted to support my father.  Most people were there because she was a teacher.  She was someone who looked for ways that she could improve other's lives and then set out to do so.  She had touched all of these people's lives and was rewarded by being remembered.

I think that is what most struggles in life are about.  We all struggle to do something that we will be remembered for.  And I don't think that there is any way to know what we will be remembered for unless we strive to rise above the common man/woman and to love deeper, give more, and sacrifice for others.  Mother Teresa said, "If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one."  Theodore Roosevelt said, “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”  It is hard to look at a world full of lies and people that use one another and to still step up and give, but I assure you that it is worth it.

I hope one day to be remembered as a loving mother and grandmother, as a true, faithful, and honest friend and lover, and as one who could help others through words and actions.  However, being remembered as someone good would be enough.