It must have been love

Today was the sad passing of Marie Fredriksson of Swedish pop-duo Roxette. She is best known for the song It Must Have Been Love, from the Pretty Woman movie.

She died of a brain tumour at the age of 61.

Why it matters to me?

I'm not normally affected by celebrities passing. But this is different for two reasons.

As a youngster I was a big Roxette fan. Most of their best stuff was before my time, but I scanned records stores (when music was sold in shops) to find their older stuff. Those CDs got very heavy listening in my younger years - and again tonight as I write this.

Also Marie was 61, the same age my mother passed away - almost to the day. So it's an extra stark reminder that the phrase "life is short" is often truer than we expect.

On average we live longer lives than generations before us, but it's obviously not the case for everyone.

What does it mean?

For me it's a reminder of that we only have a finite number of hours on the planet. Take away time for sleeping, time for home duties and life admin, time for work and commuting and there's not much left. For some the dream of a leisure-filled retirement never comes.

Let's not waste it

As business people say, time is money. Money is also time. When we spend money buying junk we don't need, we're actually spending hours of our life. Hours to shop for the item, hours to earn the money it costs, and hours to afford a home big enough for all this stuff.

That's all fine if you make your money being a world-famous Swedish pop duo and that's the life you want. But for most of us there's things in our life we'd much rather be doing - especially when we realise just how short life can be.

It's simple but not easy

What I've said may seem obvious, but it can be harder than it sounds. To examine ourselves deeply to decide what we want from life and how to best go about that with what days we have.

Or in Roxette language, to listen to your heart before deciding how to be spending my time.

Hopefully, if we do it well, then when we're fading like a flower, there'll be no question what our lives were about - it must have been love. Love of life, love for our family and friends, love for our passions and love for others.

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