If all you got to live for is what you left behind, get yourself a powder charge and seal that silver mine.

After an unexpected summer off, due to injuries suffered by drummer Mickey Hart in a car accident, the magic of 1977 resumed in full force at Raceway Park in Englishtown, New Jersey on 9/3/77. T.W.I.G.D.H. features this legendary show, which was memorialized with the October ’99 release of Dick’s Picks, Volume 15. Almost three months had passed since the landmark Spring ’77 tour ended at Winterland on June 9th, but the band didn’t miss a beat with this excellent concert that was attended by more than 100,000 fans, making it the largest ticketed concert in the U.S. at the time.

Hitting the fast-forward button through several decades, I suddenly found myself about to complete my 60th trip around the sun and “thinking a lot about less and less,” other than this incomprehensible milestone. At that pivotal moment, my daughter, Julia, asked me a question that rivaled those that are more commonly posed by our children, such as, “Where does the wind come from?” or, “Why do bad things happen to nice people?” This one was a doozy!

Dad, when you think back, what was the very best year of your life?

Immediately, my mind went to something my uncle said to me during my freshman year at UCLA. It turned out to be one of those pivotal moments that takes on far greater significance in retrospect than it did at the time. As it turned out, the genesis of one of my most closely held life principles can be traced back to that moment. He said: 

Enjoy your college years, because they will turn out to be the best years of your life.

I didn’t think much of it at the time, but I’ve thought about it plenty over the ensuing four decades, and it came echoing back to me at full volume as the way so many of a certain age might have answered the question. Simply put, the premise in my uncle’s statement is that life is best when we’re young – in our “prime” – unblemished by the inevitable life compromising effects of the aging process. This is a classic specious perspective – completely logical, superficially plausible, but ultimately false.

After the echo of my uncle’s words died down, I recognized that my life had followed a very different path during my post-college years than his had. Sure, my college years were great for their relatively carefree (some might say “reckless”), innocent, irresponsible, exploratory, energetic quality. No doubt about it. But as my mind raced forward through my fumbling 20s, entrepreneurial 30s, transformational 40s, and more peaceful 50s, I concluded that my life had gotten better and better with each passing year.

When I gave consideration to the present year, I realized that I was, indeed, living the best year of my life. The freedom of my 20s had led to a career as a self-employed publisher and a first marriage that proved to be the antecedents of accelerated personal growth; the endless hours I spent during my 30s building my businesses and raising my daughter – for several years as a single dad – served to create a context for the life I was enjoying as I approached my 60s; my efforts to conquer my personal demons, a radical change in dietary habits, and a commitment to a serious exercise regimen during my 40s proved to be pivotal, as I remarried, had another child, and shed the chronic health issues I had suffered with since my 20s; and the terrific groove I was in during my 50s included a time of financial prosperity, feelings of emotional and physical well being that belied my age and were the envy of my peers (and many younger than myself), the overcoming of a significant health crisis that could have had tragic and even fatal consequences, and a greater sense of peace in my marriage, my roles as the leader of multiple organizations, my responsibilities as a parent, and my image of myself as the man I had become.

But all of this didn’t just happen. Which is precisely why I bring it up: to inspire, motivate and guide anyone, regardless of age, to enjoy each passing year as the best year of life, rather than sadly pining for a better time gone by, as my misguided uncle did. There are certain principles which, if applied correctly and with deep commitment, will help lead you in the right direction. 

One that merits magnification comes from my junior high school English teacher, Chris Kretsinger. Mrs. Kretsinger was a strict disciplinarian with a heart of gold. She was one of those rare teachers who used her platform as the teacher of a specific subject – in her case English – to impart life lessons that would last far longer than the fundamentals of diagramming a sentence. Above the chalkboard in Mrs. Kretsinger’s classroom, to the right of her impressive collection of paddles (which she recently hastened to clarify were gifts from former students, and were displayed merely for the purpose of “encouragement”), the following words prominently appeared:

What appears to be good luck, always comes to those who have done their homework.

What has remained with me throughout the ensuing 40 years, since I attended Mrs. Kretsinger’s English class – alongside the advice that when choosing between the words “lay” and “lie” one should remember that “only a chicken lays” – is that luck is rarely random, and that “good luck” is generally not something bestowed upon us but, rather, earned through our actions. 

Fair warning: If you want each year of your life to be progressively better there will be some “homework” involved. In fact, it is the homework you do as you grow older that will determine how well you live as you move into the final decades of your life. Ideally, you’ve spent your 40s and 50s preparing for your 60s, 70s and beyond, but if not, here is another principle to embrace: It’s never too late. Your body, mind and spirit want to be healthy and vibrant, and anything you do, at any age, can enable you to live well, regardless of how old you are and irrespective of when you begin.

After experiencing my entire life flashing through my mind, I turned to my daughter and said, “I can honestly say that this year is the best year of my life,” to which she breathed a noticeable sigh of relief and replied, “I was hoping you would say that.”

As I progress through my 60s, I can honestly say that each passing year continues to be the best year of my life. But it occurred to me recently, as I was in the midst of a 12-mile trail ride through the foothills of the Rockies, that the fourth tune from the 9/3/77 show, Mississippi Half Step, offered a more poetic answer to the question at hand:

If all you got to live for is what you left behind, get yourself a powder charge and seal that silver mine.

If you want each year of your life to be better than the one before, take your eyes off of that seductive rearview mirror, envision the life you want for yourself as you look forward at the road ahead, enjoy each moment to the fullest, and heed the advice of the infinitely wise Mrs. K: Do your damn homework!