The End of The Line?

If someone were to ask me if I thought Tanish was the same person before we met, I would say no. But at the same time, in many ways, he was still the same person; his personality and his morals still stayed the same but the way he chose to go out and decide to perceive perspectives and events have changed. I hope people noticed that even after he’s 6 feet underground. The various experiences and events that Tanish has been a part of for the past years made me see how he has altered the way he handles different situations and people and ultimately contributed to his well-lived life. Despite Tanish not being able to be here with us right now, here are a few things that I believe made Tanish’s life meaningful.
Tanish and I had conversations about the influence of technology in our lives. We watched a TEDX talk together about the impact of technology and there’s this one quote that we both found to be extremely impactful. The quote mentions, “And the more facts come streaming in on us, the less time we have to process any one of them. The one thing technology doesn’t provide us with is a sense of how to make the best use of technology.” (Week 1, Why We Need to Slow Down Our Lives). This quote was extremely insightful as Tanish and I stumbled into this video during midterm week. At the time this quote was extremely insightful because with all our academic and social obligations that we need to fulfill it‘s sometimes really easy to get caught up in our work and social media that we have forgotten how to appreciate the things we have in front of us. It’s important for us to sometimes take a break from our screens no matter how urgent the task is because we need to begin to cherish the moments with the people who matter the most to us. 
In addition to slowing down our lives, Tanish also found solace in understanding others and their differences. F.R Hesburgh once said, “The assumption people have is that every time you have changed, it’s bad. I say I assume that change is the price of progress.” Tanish prioritized creating change in our society, and viewing our counterparts as equals is extremely significant to progress as a community. Throughout his life, he adopted the values Fr. Hesburgh demonstrated throughout the documentary and create change in efforts of creating progress (Week 2, Hesburgh). Tanish also adopted values into his career. At times it was tough for him to discover the passions he wanted to pursue as a career. It’s tough to stick with our interests and what career path is the best fit for us because it’s tough to look past the monetary incentives a job offers you and pursue something you feel genuinely passionate about. However, as his close friend, it was evident that he pursued the things he felt passionate about, which is why I believe he lived a life well-lived (Week 4, Exploring A Life Well-Lived). I believe that Tanish also lived a good life because he looked for advice from his mentors. With help from his mentors, he was able to introspect the reasons behind why he does the things he does.  This is what led him to live a life where he can be used as a means for good but simultaneously work a lucrative career to pursue things that he personally enjoys doing. It was important to him to become a means for good because there are many social issues that he resonated with that I believe need more attention including equality that needs to be more pressed on in our present culture (Week 5, Interview). 
I believe Tanish adopted all these values because of his spiritual beliefs. During one of his Moreau classes, he understood the importance of self-reflection and how important it was to ground himself spiritually. As it lead him to reflect back on the things he could’ve done better which allowed him to improve as a person (Week 6, The Right Way to Be Instropective) and altered the way he began to form relationships (Week 7, Why The Only Future Worth Living Includes Everyone).  
To close off this eulogy, I would like to quote Sister Aletheia, “My life is going to end, and I have a limited amount of time. We naturally tend to think of our lives as kind of continuing and continuing.” We often forget that we never know how much time left we have on this earth and always take the little things in life for granted. The mindset of us being young and thinking that we have all the time in the world is the wrong mindset to have. We must find ways to remind ourselves that life is precious and wisely spend the time we have here. Now, we worry about the most arbitrary things. We have to learn that it’s okay to let loose and understand that we should spend our time on this earth with the people we care and love and set aside time for things that make me happy and fulfilled. We never know how much time we have left. We must understand that fulfilling goals that don’t make us happy in the long run are not equivalent to a life well-lived. We have to focus our efforts and time on moments and causes we deem important and pursue things that genuinely make us happy (Week 3, Meet the Nun Who Wants You to Remember You’ll Die). 
It may be the end of the line for Tanish, but it’s not for everyone listening to this eulogy. When you dedicate yourself to living life to the fullest, you feel like you can overcome anything. Each day is an opportunity for greatness, and you feel fresh and ready to find it. In addition, living life to the fullest means you are in tune with yourself. This allows you to make conscious decisions that directly affect you.