Excerpt: Living Life to the Fullest

As an advocate, mentor and teacher, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh special education professor Craig Fiedler shared many lessons with his students, family and friends throughout his lifetime. Although he passed away in January 2009, Fiedler's legacy continues today, through a newly established scholarship in his name and his books.

The following is an excerpt from Chapter 7 of Cancer as Identity Theft: Robbery and Redemption:

Everyone in my situation is advised to spend however much time you have left by living life to its fullest. Living with a terminal illness is like being stamped with a consumer product code that says “Best if used by …”

I now have an expiration date, and I want to be as fresh as possible for as long as possible. But I am not sure what or how to live life to the fullest. That’s a very individual and personal issue.

For me, it means: not taking loved ones or friends for granted, breathing deeply, reading about and contemplating complex and important issues of the day, sitting around doing nothing, watching a baseball game, traveling to a new place, walking in the woods, hugging family members and friends, watching my dog play in the backyard, drinking a pina colada, writing, appreciating the change of seasons, smelling a camp fire …

Of course, there’s much more, but what I am trying to say is that living your life to the fullest is about being more engaged and alert to your everyday existence. It is about making no assumptions of the future. It is about a particular moment.