Write Your Own Obituary to Find Out if You Lead a Meaningful Life

Greetings from Washington, D.C. where we’re all tuckered out from the excitement caused by former Trump Organization attorney Michael Cohen’s nearly eight hours of public testimony before the House Oversight Committee. On Wednesday, the day of the hearing, Capitol Hill saloons opened during breakfast hours to welcome throngs of thirsty politics junkies.

Oh, how I love this city!

Earlier this week, Washington Post obituary writer Adam Bernstein chronicled the life of the late Jim Nicholson, a journalist with the Philadelphia Daily News who established the practice of writing epic obituaries of everyday people.

Nicholson’s death got me thinking about my father’s passing in mid-January when it fell to me — the writer in the family — to draft his obituary. The words came easily, because, writing about Arnie Smolen, I quickly discovered that he had indeed lived a truly meaningful life. Among Arnie’s many accomplishments, he earned a stellar reputation among peers and clients in representing the American contemporary furniture trade.

Could our own lives rise gloriously to meaningfulness? I believe that if we set about the task of writing our own obituaries we surely would find out. But even if most of us hate writing, because we feel that we don’t do it well or…