May 11, 2011. Omar Ahmad, I miss you. 

That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet.

I think of Emily Dickinson's poem as I reflect on the shockingly sudden passing of my dear friend Omar Ahmad, who left this world on May 10, 2011. 

Omar was a great optimist who made me think about possibilities, and he inspired me to want to do something great...

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the question now. Perhaps then, some day far in the future, you will gradually without even noticing it, live your way in to the answer.

~Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Stephen Mitchell (via Kristen Collins)

The past few years I've felt the pain of loss of several close friends.

It hurts. I miss Omar. A lot. Even as I watch Omar's memorial.

I remember from ten life lessons: Don't take yourself too seriously.

I do feel like I didn't spend enough time with Omar.

And neither did Rohit. Or our little friend. Though we be successful.

I loved Omar. He was truly a friend who inspired me to be kind.

I will watch Omar's TED talk again and again as a reminder to be active.

I truly miss you, Omar. I truly do. And I still feel connected to you.

Thank you, Omar. You and Steve Jobs inspire me to do something great -- to design something simple that brings great happiness to others with what is left of my life...

Almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure -- these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

It's worth repeating what Steve Jobs said.

"There is no reason not to follow your heart."

Life and death, energy and peace. If I stop today it was still worth it. Even the terrible mistakes that I made and would have unmade if I could. The pains that have burned me and scarred my soul, it was worth it, for having been allowed to walk where I've walked, which was to hell on earth, heaven on earth, back again, into, under, far in between, through it, in it, and above. ~Gia Marie Carangi

http://thinkexist.com/quotation/life-and-death-energy-and-peace-if-i-stop-tod...

The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity answered, “Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

https://plus.google.com/107540638333054762391/posts/bCZ9s7CmhvM

We are all reincarnations.

http://www.facebook.com/adam.rifkin/posts/345923075423937

Carry out ONE random act of kindness a day, with no expectation of reward. #RAOK

letting go is grace fulfilled ...

How do you define grace?

the old fashioned way: of divine influence and beneficence