Immortality: Desires Fulfilled
Let’s talk—really talk—about death. As humans, our fear of dying is rooted in the unknown and in the fear of unfinished business. We don’t know what happens to us after we die. Do we have a soul? Is there a heaven, a hell, a purgatory? Or do we simply decay, conscious and trapped in our graves until the end of time?
In the film After.Life, a funeral director convinces a woman that she is dead, forcing her to confront her deepest fears. She believes she cannot move, cannot leave her body, cannot escape. Towards the end of the movie, she realizes she isn’t truly dead, but the idea lingers. What if we are conscious when we die? What if we are given eternity to think about everything we never did—the person we never loved, the trip we never took, the concert we missed, the career we postponed? As humans, we live—and possibly die—knowing this truth.
In my book, Tara never has to face these fears. I wrote her story to imagine a life where the world is hers. Tara never dies. She never runs out of time. The Earth is large, with endless opportunities, and she could literally achieve anything.
But while writing her story, I realized something: none of that mattered to Tara. Success filled her cup no more than tying her shoes. What mattered to her—what always mattered—were the people she loved and the experiences she shared with them.
When I began writing this story, I was obsessed with how much success I could achieve before I died. How fully I could live my purpose before time ran out. As a nearly 47-year-old woman, my perspective has shifted—and continues to shift—as I reflect on this story. I still live my purpose and my truth, but like Tara, I now understand that what matters most is connection. Real connection. The kind that fills your cup until it overflows—far beyond any success or endless time.
Writing this story wasn’t about living forever. It was about finding purpose through love and connection.
In closing, I’ll play devil’s advocate. What if Tara succeeded at everything? What if, in her 750 years of life, she accomplished every goal and fulfilled every desire? That would have been a very boring story. As humans, we fantasize about what we could do with infinite time, but once we remember what truly matters, we realize that we already have enough time, time to connect, to love deeply, and to find purpose.
Even with death in our future, we still have everything we need, time means nothing.
Tara understands this fundamental truth—and through her story, so do I.
