“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.” — Seneca

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. The steady beat of the clock, measuring the passing of our lives.

Tick…tock…tick…tock—the slow, unbearable rhythm of moments we wish would end.

Ticktockticktock—the rapid pulse of time slipping away too fast, taking with it moments we ache to hold onto.

When we measure our lives in time, some moments seem endless: the agonizing wait in a doctor’s office, the heavy silence before a difficult conversation, the anxious pause before life-changing news. Others vanish too quickly: the fading innocence of childhood, a weekend spent with a loved one, the fleeting glow of a sunset that disappears before we’re ready to say goodbye.

We cling to some moments, desperate to make them last. We will others to pass more quickly. But what if time is not the true measure of a life? What if something else is?

Maybe the best way to answer is not with a single answer, but with more questions:

• Did we live fully?
• Did we embrace both discomfort and ease?
• Did we learn and grow?
• Did we lift others up along the way?

If not time, maybe the measure of a life is presence. Or connection. Or how deeply we allow ourselves to feel—both the fleeting and the infinite.

I don’t know if there’s a universal answer. I don’t even know if the answer I give today will be the same one I’d give in the future. And maybe that’s the point.

Maybe the measure of a life isn’t something fixed.
Maybe it’s something we discover as we live it.

So, what will yours be?