Much of what we leave is not what we planned — it is what we were, in the moments we were not performing ourselves. The child who watched how you treated strangers, the student who absorbed your curiosity alongside your curriculum, the community that remembered how you showed up in crisis: these inheritances were never announced and are often more lasting than the ones we intended. The unexamined life leaves an unintended legacy; the examined one can close the gap.
Each step builds on the last.