If there’s one thing I know, it’s that life is not a rehearsal. But I haven't always known that. I had a difficult childhood , which meant that I’d entered adult life very guarded: emotionally shut down, shy and withdrawn. I was only 18 when I married my husband, Ken. We were living in Port Augusta, where I stayed at home, preparing to start a family. I was living, and I didn't know it then, but I wasn’t truly alive. Almost four years later, in January 1990, Ken died after a 6-month battle with an infection inside his heart. Suddenly I was a 22 year-old widow with a two-year-old daughter and a three-month-old baby.

A month after Ken’s death, my father turned fifty. It was the night of his birthday celebration, and there I was, newly widowed with two young children. I remember looking at Dad, and thinking, Wow, so this is what fifty years looks like? You've got your house. You've got your job - the same job you’ve been doing since I was born - but what else? How have you lived, beyond the treadmill of work, meetings, mortgage and 20 days’ annual leave?

I never saw Dad look truly happy, just surviving. He was kind to everyone around him, but I was never sure if what showed up on the outside was really what he felt inside. He looked to just be marking time. He did that for 14 more years; he died at age 64. The day of my Dad’s 50th birthday was the day I received my very first whisper, was there any more to this life?

A few months later the answer came. In a moment of frustration, my little girl demanded of me; “I just want my Daddy!”
That single request woke me up like nothing else could have. I realised I had been living each day shut down, filled with sadness for what had happened in my life. I couldn't bring her Daddy back, but what I heard in her words was “please bring me someone who will show up and live life with us!”

It was in that moment that I realised. I would be 50 soon enough. I had a young family to share life with, to live life to the fullest capacity. What did I want to do with this wild and precious life inside me? What did I want? I did not want my children looking at me like I'd looked at my Dad. I determined to make sure that when death came knocking for me, that it found me not just living, but truly alive. What does this mean?

To me, it means living authentically. Being the fullest version of yourself. Turning to face the reality of death - so that we live life openly, joyously, wildly, abundantly, every day that we are alive. It means asking ourselves what we want from this one precious life, consciously choosing how we want to live, and knowing that whatever it is you truly want, it is not only possible or probable: it is inevitable.