I had never given much thought to expiration dates before that fateful summer afternoon. As I stood in my kitchen, staring at the moldy bread I’d just pulled from the pantry, a realization hit me like a bolt of lightning: nothing in this world has a really long life span, everything has its own shelf life.
It all began with the bread.
According to one article from healthline says that commercially packaged breads are best consumed within three to seven days after which they may start to develop mold.
But, It was not just a matter of the bread though. I looked around the kitchen and for the first time I realized how many things in the kitchen have a time limit.
The milk in my fridge? It is safe to consume about one week after the “sell by” date provided it is stored in a refrigerator. The eggs? About three to five weeks from the time they are packaged. Not even my most favorite beverage, the coffee which I store in the air tight container, would retain its taste after two weeks of being grounded.
However, as I thought about these ordinary things. Then I started thinking about the more considerable and important things in life. But what about the other spheres of my life? My friends, my concepts, even my life?
I remembered my some school friends. They say that we were the best of friends, we used to tell each other everything, our likes, our dislikes, our hopes and our aspirations. At present, we just whish each other birthday ad liked and commented day post in the social media platform.
A study conducted by the journal “Social Networks” reveals that the average friendship has a shelf life of seven years.
Had we already gone past the best before date?
My career dreams vision came to my head. The values that I once believed were counter-cultural became rather cliched.
In the current fast changing world, the half-life of a professional skill is estimated to be five years, meaning that half of the workers in a certain profession will need to update their skills in every five years.
Was I relevant, or was I starting to be a part of the old generations who are left behind?
Even love….
Love. which is one of the most important and the most enduring feelings of a person, is not protected from the processes of aging.
According to previous studies, the emotions that are associated with new love and relationships are said to last for about one to one and half years. Then it moves to the second stage which is companionate love and if it does not develop to this stage, it declines.
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At the same time these thoughts were running in my mind I realized that I needed to get the most out of everything while I could.
I picked the key and rushed out of my home to meet people, to revive the old friendships, to revive my hobbies, and to give new direction to the relations.
The first place I went to was the local community center. Ever since I was a child, I wanted to paint, but I never really started because I thought there would be plenty of time to do so.
I suppose I understood that even the desires we have are not eternal and have a shelf life.
Researches reveal that the personality and the interests of an individual may transform in a short time with the most dramatic changes being realized in the 20s and 30s. In this way, if I do not grab this interest now, I am afraid that I will never be interested in it again.
This was when I enrolled for an art class for my hobby. And I happened to start a conversation with the man sitting next to me, an old man of 82 years of age, Harold. “I began painting when I was a retired man,” he said looking at me with a gleam in his eyes.
Better late than never one may say.
Harold’s words were something I could relate to; people say that the full cognitive potential of a human is usually achieved between the ages of 27 and 33, but what they fail to realize is that the human brain is rewiring itself until the day we die. In fact, the process of taking up new activities and gaining new knowledge can also be useful in preserving the cognitive function in the later years of an individual’s life.
Taking my cue from Harold I compiled a list of all the things that I have been neglecting to do.
- Having a new language
- going to the country which I have always wanted to visit
- telling parents how much I owe them. Specially to my dad.
These are also events with their own expiry dates. One couldn’t do them much longer as the chance to do so would not last forever.
While back home. On the window there was a stand of the classical literature in one store. This made me ponder on one of the biggest questions of the day: Idea Shelf Life.
Certain ideas have been around for ages; be it the creation of Shakespeare’s plays or the reflections of Socrates and Plato. Some have been obsolete for a very long time such as the theory that the earth is the center of the universe.
Science and knowledge that we consider to be factual and undeniably correct also has its expiration date.
The half-life of a scientific paper — the time it takes for half of the papers in a specific area of study to be either rejected or become ineffective — ranges can be as short as few years in advanced fields such as computer science.
I was able to realize the importance of learning in the process especially the importance of lifelong learning.
This means that there is always a need for change and the only way to effect the change is to discard the old and adopt the new. It is a process that goes on for ever, much like the circle of life that we hear about.
When talking about life, I could not help but think about my own death.
According to the World Health Organization, the average life expectancy of people is 73.4 years, with some variance. But it is not only the issue of the quantity of life; it is also the quality of life. Research has indicated that persons who have purpose in life and are involved in goal directed activities tends to have longer and healthier lives.
Perception of time is one of the interesting phenomena which has been explored by psychologists; people tend to over-exaggerate the time they have. This ‘end of history illusion’ makes us complacent, makes us believe that we cannot, and will not change, the way we are.
However, change is something that is constant and time is a very limited resource.
That night as I was in bed I thought about what I had learned that day and it was alot. The expiry of food products made me ponder on the issues of temporal nature of things in life including relationship, ideas, talents and even life itself. However, instead of being gloomy with this thought, I felt this was a great opportunity to be energetic.
Realizing that everything has an expiry date does not necessarily have to be stressful. Rather, it may be a great way to motivate oneself to get the best out of the remaining time. It reminds us to foster the bonds that we have with the people around us, to do what we love, and to always learn new things.
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I hope you enjoyed reading. This blog post comes from what I’ve learned, what I think, and what I believe. The named used in this blog post are not real.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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Photo credit: Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash
