Dave Evans

I said, so Gary, you're not going to die of old age.

You're going to die of something else, and maybe you're going to die of a stroke.

So maybe what's going on is, how do you live well through being a person who comes from a long line of guys with bad stroke DNA?

And he just stared at me.

He said, do you think that might be it?

I said, well, Gary, lots of people die in their 50s.

You might be one of them.

He said, well, if that's what's going on, what do I do?

I said, well, you do this as well as you can.

So we had a long conversation about that.

Well, this is where I make the distinction between nice and loving.

You know, are you trying to be nice to somebody or trying to love them?

And sometimes that love, I don't mean tough love and you have to beat them up.

I wasn't trying to be unkind.

But if it's true that he's going to die of a stroke, which he did,

about four strokes later, then either he's going to do that and be blindsided by it and terrified at the moment of death and leave his family in some despair about his final days, or he's got a little more time to do this well.

So what's the kindest thing I can do?

The kindest thing I can do is give him a shot at the invitation to actually find the meaning and the joy that is available.

I'm not in charge of his fixing his brain, but I might be able to give him an invitation to a little more life-giving experience than he's currently having.

Well, we had that conversation and he received it reasonably well.