Steve Jobs and George Harrison: Legacy of Fulfilling Life’s Potential

Steve Jobs has passed on from this world. This provides all of us with an opportunity to reflect on the potential of what one life can accomplish. Am I living up to all that I can be, or have I allowed the details of everyday life to lull me into a high-functioning mediocrity? Another reminder comes in the form of a retrospective on the life of George Harrison, the Beatle’s guitarist who died of lung cancer in 2001. Martin Scorsese’s biographical documentary, George Harrison: Living in the Material World, is a two-part film on HBO that begins this week. Both of these men were artistic giants who valued deep friendships, spiritual pursuits, and living up to their belief that one person can make a big difference in the world. They shared another extraordinary quality: the resilience and determination to overcome adversity, rejection, and the scorn of a sometimes fickle public. And, of course, to face their own mortality gracefully, with dignity and no regrets. Let us take inspiration from these two “Renaissance Men” to face our own mortality, and that of our loved ones, and step up to fulfill our highest potential. Let’s leave any high-functioning mediocrity behind.

Now on a practical and personal note, we work with people all over the country/ world who are losing or have lost important people in their lives. And we never know when it may be someone’s time to go. One day life seems great, the next day someone we know commits suicide, or gets a serious diagnosis, or is in an accident and dies, or is disabled. If we have what Dr. Fritz Perls labeled “unfinished business” with that person, it may be too late or inappropriate to finish it. When David’s brother Peter was suddenly murdered in his sleep by his mentally ill wife Nancy, we got to see how this whole principle works. There was rage towards the wife, of course, and feelings that still have not been resolved even after five years. Some family members had unfinished business with Peter that were suddenly frozen in a timeless void and certainly could no longer be resolved. I have seen this over and over. Those with unfinished business have difficulty grieving because their resentments, or their regrets, got in the way. I have watched at family gatherings how anger, resentments, guilt and blame still contaminate the fond memories of the person who has passed on.

It appears that when we have not completed our work with close family members and friends, we have difficulty letting them go when they are trying to leave, trouble grieving when they do go, and continued turmoil that lives on within us seemingly stuck without end. David’s mother Helen was the best example for our family of how to let go of the blame, anger and regret. She was immediately able to truly forgive Nancy with an amazing display of compassionate love and true caring.

This is what I see with Steve Jobs and George Harrison as they passed on. They seem to have completed their relationships with those closest to them, and in fact with the whole world! They are both shining examples of living life to its fullest, and dying in a way that inspires those left behind. So this healing work that we do is about completing unfinished business with people in our lives to the best of our ability. So that if we or they should be facing death suddenly or unexpectedly, there is nothing in the way of pure caring. This allows people to grieve cleanly without the contamination of regrets, blame or judgments. It allow family members and friends to let go more easily so that the dying person is free to “go to the light” when their soul is called to do so. And it allows those left behind to take inspiration to live their life every day to its fullest potential.

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