I was reading the intro to a book on Happiness the other day, and he asked: if you knew you were going to die in 15 minutes, what would you do? I thought about it, and decided I would do whatever I was going to do anyway.
In a very real sense, everything you do matters, but it also doesn’t matter at all. It is the relative motion that matters. For me, I feel like I have been swimming upstream without break my entire life. I don’t say that to complain, simply as a statement of fact: that’s how I feel.
Yet, I have kept going. I have not faltered. I have fought my battles, and constantly struggled to do what is right, and further to the best of my ability what is Good in this world. I have never let up.
So whether my time comes soon or many years from now, I think I will face it in the spirit in which you get a cavity filled. It’s not something I look forward to, but it is something that is necessary. If I am right, then life is better and easier on the other side. If I am wrong in my metaphysics, then I will never know it.
Either way, I have no regrets. I have done with my time what I can. As Camus put it, “Judgement day is every day.” If you remember that, then I think you can go out calmly.