“What’s one thing that you want people to remember about you when you die?”

This question came up when I was playing a card game with my friends a few months ago in Indonesia. I hadn’t thought about this for a long while, and in that moment, I realised how much I’ve changed as a person.

I used to associate this question with some kind of achievement, a grandeur masterpiece, or fame from creating a massive impact on people. To my own surprise, I confidently answered that question with one word: “warmth”.

In this big and cold world, I only hope I could keep radiating my warmth to those around me. I don’t think I am the same ambitious guy who thinks he will ultimately feel content when he smashed his big dreams anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I still have milestones I would like to achieve before I kick the bucket. However, having yet to achieve them does not make my life less complete. As long as I keep holding onto the warmth that I radiate and be a sanctuary for myself and the people around me, I feel content.

“I don’t mind dying in this state”, I added, having felt affection from friends and family back home throughout that whole trip, and knowing that my closest ones in Melbourne are happy and rooting for me. I recall a period a few months before when I broke down in tears and felt like I was standing up for myself, and the journey that I took to get to this state. The very state where worries about the future and the past are irrelevant, where I feel my growth as a person solidify, and where I can fearlessly feel, express, and exchange love with those I care about. This is the only state I will be ready to die in. At least for now.

Someone used to keep reminding me, “you don’t owe the world anything”. Although I always thought of it as irrelevant as I believed my ambitions were products of my longing for recognition and acceptance rather than to give back to the world, it’s been slowly growing on me. Maybe the trauma from those years of rejection has healed. Maybe, I came to understand better the things that are important to me. Or maybe I’ve just gone complacent and the 50-year-old me might regret having this mentality in my youth, no one knows. But for now, I know for sure that this is what I want people to remember about me when I die.