Morrie's lessones of life - Book Report/Review Example

It is a Buddhist-inspired lesson taking off from the image of a bird on one's shoulder that a person asks as a kind of oracle, of whether that day where one is present is that person's last day on earth is. Being aware that after all life does not go on indefinitely, and that one can die at any time, is the beginning of a real appreciation of life, in all of its fleeting and conditional glory. The psychology is not difficult to understand. When one thinks that one has all the time in the world, the present is devalued, and one wastes time pursuing idle pursuits or just being mean to others and to oneself.

Pettiness is the natural condition that may arise from the false notion that one has infinite time. On the other hand Morrie notes that all people will die, and the time of death cannot be foretold, nor can one foresee how much time one has left on earth. The lesson that one only begins to live when one appreciates one's own mortality and the conditional nature of one's continued stay on earth is the lesson that one seizes the day and makes the most out of all the time left when one is not sure when one is going to leave.

It is a lesson in presence, in distilling life into its most important and vital aspects. For instance, knowing that one is to die, then it makes sense to know how to die from all that one is, and in so doing one learns simultaneously what true living is. It is a state of mind that is aware of all this and in that awareness develops a capacity for living, like a secret ingredient to true life. That secret ingredient, according to Morrie, is the knowledge of how to die. Essentially it is a lesson on how Morrie himself, pressed for time because of the disease that is pulling him to his grave, has come to grasp the meaning of living, because in so many words he was saying that he had learned how it is that one is to die.

Surrender too is a vital aspect of this learning to die process, because there is no guarantee that one will continue to exist moving forward. It is an illusion, and as such those who live in illusion are unable to see death staring them in the face every day. This illusion, by extension, also robs people of the capacity for real living (Albom, 2002, pp. 80-89; SparkNotes LLC, 2013). The fourth Tuesday lesson is special in this way, that in a profound way it explains Morrie and how Morrie seems to want to make the most of the remaining days of his life.

The lesson also seems to hold the key as to why he seems able to accept his fate and he seems live the truth of that great insight into life. At that point the signs of death have continued to creep into and near Morrie, and that latest sign was the oxygen machine. In spite of that Morrie seemed determined to continue to make the most out of his time. The oxygen machine can be a metaphor too for the bird on the shoulder. The bird on the shoulder to Morrie is the signification and the reminder of death and of the way nothing in this earth is destined to last forever.

It is a reminder too that things are touch and go basically, as it was for Morrie. At the same time the flip side to that constant awareness of death is the blooming consciousness of what it is to live. The two visions are two sides of the same coin. The same intense awareness of death for instance also translates to an intense awareness