Chasing Daylight

Chasing Daylight: How My Forthcoming Death Transformed My Life - Eugene O'Kelley
In May 2005, at the age of 53, Eugene O'Kelley, Chairman and CEO of KPMG, one of the largest U.S. accounting firms, was told that he had 3 months to live - about 100 days. The late-stage brain cancer with which he was diagnosed, would lead to a relatively painfree demise. Eventually, his vision would blur and he would pass into a coma. Being the businessman that he was, O'Kelley meticulously planned out his final days. He sought to manage his own death in a conscious fashion. A methodical, organized, unequivocating, and thorough man, he did not know how to do anything unplanned. O'Kelley admits that "it sounds pretty weird to try to be CEO of one's own death" (16). A religious man, O'Kelley does not view himself as "master of his fate" so much as "master of his farewell." His reflections and actions in relation to his immanent death are provocative and compelling. At one point he writes of how commitment is not measured by time but by energy: "In fact, it's not about time. It's not about reliability and predictability. Commitment is about depth. It's about effort. It's about passion. It's about wanting to be in a certain place, and not somewhere else. Of course time is involved; it would be naive and illogical to suggest otherwise. But commitment is best measured not by the time one is willing to give up but, more accurately, by the energy one wants to put in, by how present one is" (78). O'Kelley takes advantage of his opportunity to "stop and look up long enough to think about the people we love and why we love them, and to go and tell them explicitly how we feel, because who knows when that opportunity will disappear forever?" (100). Great words of wisdom to live by! It is too bad that it often takes a serious encounter with death to allow this to sink in!