Customer Reviews

Chasing Daylight: How My Forthcoming Death Transformed My Life

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The CEO of a Fortune 500 company learns he has inoperable brain cancer and sets out to make the very best use of his remaining weeks. With the same energy and vigor he ran his company, he now learns how to let go and value the moments which remain to him.
Well written. Inspiring. Not saccharine sweet.

This unique book offers unusual perspective on living through the eyes of a terminally ill man. Gene O'Kelly systematic way of thinking and emotion competence aid him as he plans out how to make the most of his time on earth. O'Kelly's extreme professional success (CEO of KPMG at the onset of his illness) give him an opportunity to have a widely heard voice.
O'Kelly's system of tiering people by the importance of their relationships and then allocating time and energy accordingly is interesting, thoughtful, even if it may come across as mechanical at times. Who's to say how one should live their last 3 months of life?
Unfortunately, I was hoping for more of spiritual depth and perspective. O'Kelly mentions cultural Christianity and something like Buddhism/transcendental meditation, but doesn't suggest much concrete guidance on how his last days might have sharpened his focus or his relationship with God. I found the numerous references to "centering myself" "right myself" and "finding balance" to be distracting and they left me wishing for more from and for him.
I thought the following were real nuggets in the book:
1. Make time "slow down" by really savoring the good things in life, really considering what messages you want to send to people important to you to be thought provoking and inspiring.
2. We should all take time, regularly, to consider our impending deaths (we'll rarely know whether they are far off or just around the corner) and see if we like where we spend our time, energy, and emotion or whether we need to make changes.
3. Don't be too distracted by work. Coming from a man of such great accomplishment professionally, it seems that he could have used more family balance in his life and had some regrets.
4. "You can't control everything." Again hearing this from such an accomplished and driven man, the admission is striking - though obviously true. He describes both his journey to acceptance of his plight and the importance that this acceptance had in allowing him to enjoy and make the most of his final days and months.
5. While time spent is a measure of one's commitment level, the amount of energy and focus spent on the topic or person is even more of a gauge.
6. Have an "Italian mindset" - look at past decisions as truly in the past and focus on the future. "The only decision to focus on is the one you are still able to make." This seems to have wisdom as long as it doesn't preclude learning from our mistakes.
7. His plan to "beautifully resolve" his personal relationships - to bring pleasure to them and himself, to cause himself to think deeply about those close to him.
a. Key moments shared together
b. How they met.
c. What had caused them to become friends
d. Qualities O'Kelly appreciated in them
e. Things he'd learned from each
f. How they'd helped him become a better person.
g. Often the meeting would take place in a special place and/or include a symbolic gift.
h. How much he appreciated close friends telling him "goodbye" at their last meeting as opposed to other things, like "keep the faith".
8. His reflection on how he'd spent too much time at work - to the expense of his family and, he states - possibly to expense of his own productivity and creativity.
9. O'Kelly suggests an intentional focus on things (I'll call them blessings) we've been given - really pausing to take in the beauty of nature, really appreciating the taste of food and drink, really enjoying time with people. I liked this admonition the best in this book. I've noticed I can "get through" almost any experience, even ones I generally like, in a distracted, detached way. I can also focus on and really enjoy them. It is a matter of focus.
10. Norman Vincent Peale quote, "Change your thoughts and change your world."
11. And, from Wife Corinne, who writes the final chapter:
a. How Gene coming to terms with his own death was so key to how he approached dying: "To die in peace, you must first accept that you are dying."
b. "when you are motivated by fear, you are not able to see the best path - whether in death or in life."
In summary, I'm glad I read "Chasing Daylight" because of the helpful perspective the author offers regarding dying, since I too will die someday. More importantly, I hope to live in a way where I avoid some of his regrets and be more intentional about appreciating and enjoying my own blessings.

This was a truly inspiring memoir that I believe took so much courage to write, or co-write as it were. His ability to embrace his life in the face of his imminent death was awe inspiring, even if I can't relate to his approach to business, golf and life (and death). Of course I wish death for no one, including myself, but I am always amazed at how anyone who is faced with dying deals with that reality, since I feel I would be a coward in the same situation. It is the simple task of these people, Eugene specifically in this testimony, that give me strength and encouragement that I will be brave as well.

This book is an outstanding and extraordinary treasure. There are some books available about life and dying. Eugene O'Kelly's and Corinne O'Kelly's book is a unique contribution.

Some critics are focusing on the judgement of Eugene O'Kelly's way to proceed after he got his brain cancer diagnose. This is the wrong way. The right way is to judge oneself about the way to live and prepare for death. I found the book in the list of the 100 Best Business Books of all Time. A very important recommendation which everybody should follow, whether in business, whether struggling for a better life, and a better preparation for the time which comes for all of us. To Corinne O'Kelly and Eugene O'Kelly: many thanks and my deepest respect.

A friend, who has had to face her own mortality much, much too early, gave me this amazing book. I am the kind of person who likes to have a plan or two ("just in case"!) to handle potential issues in my life. Then I improvise! Like the author, I enjoy the challenge of imbuing each step of existence with consciousness and a few belly laughs .

Mr. O'Kelly's memoir, of the final three months of his life, is a roadmap of his own challenging walk through unchartered territory. His way of dealing with impending death, by personally speaking with most of the people who had made his life full, was especially inspiring. This is the kind of book we read, ponder and put onto that special shelf for when we inevitably need it again.

I am half way through this book and could not put it down! I thought it would be more about the man and how he rose to the top of his field but it's instead a book about facing terminal illness and dying.
The author was so brave and his thoughts are captured very well.
It's a very sad book though because this man was at the top of his field, loved his life -- appeared to have it all -- and then is diagnosed with terminal brain cancer for which there is no cure. Really sad.
It's a reflective read and the message is live in the moment because that's all we really have. I will remember this more as a sad account of someone bravely facing their own death. Reminded me of my father who at age 57 was diagnosed with terminal cancer and died five months later.

Overall, good book and inspiring man but the story is too sad for me. I guess I want to live in the moment too and not think on death too much before I have to!

I appreciate the fact that this book was written. The author showed extraordinary courage and clear thinking while under the cloud of knowing he was dying. Yet thousands of people live with this knowledge everyday and we do not hear from them. I am left wondering how a book of this nature written by someone without the resources of this author would read. Most of us can't identify with the wealth and comforts Mr. O'Kelly had at his disposal to smooth his path. This is not a criticism, just makes one wonder.

This is a first person telling of the way in which one person, who happened to be a wealthy Type A personality, prepared himself and his family and friends for his own death. The additional chapters and interviews by his wife are just as interesting. There was not as much information about the physical effects of the cancer as I had expected.

I only gave 4 stars instead of 5 because I did not find CHASING DAYLIGHT: HOW MY FORTHCOMING DEATH TRANSFORMED MY LIFE, by Eugene Kelly to be particularly well-written, but I did find a very valuable lesson that has really served to open my own eyes to my own life. That lesson is to live "in the moment". There is no doubt, this is the lesson Kelly wanted the reader to take away and he did a superb job of illustrating just that.

Most of us have lives today that are pulling us in every direction. We have deadlines to meet, an inbox full of emails, calls to return, traffic jams and a mulititude of other complexities that make it difficult to go through life "living in the moment". I think most people are guilty of it and certainly admit that I am. The demands of job, family, commitments and obligations can be overwhelming to the point that when we are at work, we're thinking about problems at home, or when we're at home, we're thinking about the work we need to be doing and this chain reaction takes our focus away from where it should be.

Kelly's story has certainly enhanced my cognition of this fact and has caused me to re-focus my priorities as well as my commitment to give my undivided attention to whatever activity is taking place around me. This book is just one more reminder to not worry about the little details of life that bog us down. We all need those reminders now and then and this book is a pretty good one.

This was an amazing book with lessons on how to live and how to die. It was mesmirizing and I oould not put it down. It is about a high paid executive who is really busy and then is told he is terminally ill. He and his wife set out to live the rest of his life with dignity and calls, writes or meets with the people who have touched his life. He also has things he wants to do, and the book teaches you must not wait. It was very inspiring and probably the best book about a person facing death. His family has a lot to be proud of.