You can't take it with you...

When we went over to Nana and Papa's the day that Papa died, Papa was still there. I'd never seen a dead person before, except for at my grandfather's funeral when I was six. It was both fascinating and a bit creepy to observe a body without a soul. What was once Papa was now just a shell resembling Papa.

It causes me great excitement to consider that Papa was having a conversation with Jesus before he passed. How miserable must it be to wonder where a loved one went when they died, or to believe that they went nowhere at all, but simply ceased existing. In the weeks since the funeral I've also wondered what it would be like to lose someone before you were ready for it. In Papa's case, most of the family was as emotionally prepared as possible, but when death is unexpected...I don't truly wish to know, but I do wonder.

I've also been considering, have seen Papa's body, the role of the physical body in our being. Physical bodies seem so important in the world I live in. In Austin, Texas people strive to look good, so they exercise and are careful about what they eat. They also strive to have optimal health to live long and comfortably in their bodies. There are running clubs, biking groups and yoga studios galore. People shop for local, unprocessed foods at Whole Foods and the farmer's markets, and alternatives to fast food like Snap Kitchen and My Fit Foods are all over. Health and fitness are HUGE here, and that doesn't even take into account the fact that I work in the fitness industry. In fact, if there was one thing I'd have to say is important to the majority of Austinites, I'd say it's caring for their physical bodies.

When Papa went, he left his physical body behind. And when I go, after all my hard work of eating healthily and staying fit, I too will leave my physical body behind. It's easy for me to understand that it is important to care for our bodies because they are something that we were given to care for. And it really does take significant effort to care well for bodies because these days all that is available to us is not necessarily good for us. It's not easy to know what is good for our bodies and what isn't. Also, most jobs these days do not have exercise built in. It requires effort to be fit and healthy. But, as with all good things, do we not tend to take this a bit too far?

I don't have any profound thoughts about this, but I do wonder how many of us invest more of our resources in our physical bodies than anything else. Do we act as though our physical bodies are the true cause of our lives? If I put more time, energy and money into my physical body than any other aspect of my being, does that mean that it's more important to me than any other aspect of my being, including the eternal aspect of my being? (This assumes that a person is past the state of simply trying to find enough food to survive, but is striving for maximum comfort, beauty, longevity, etc.)