I am Maya Calabria and I believe in living fully.

You can filter your experiences in the hopes that you will protect yourself from pain and fear. Nothing can hurt you from an arm’s length away. By reserving your emotions, investing less interest, and taking fewer risks you can lessen any pain that comes your way. But all at the cost of never feeling anything more than you allow yourself to. Or you can dream big, love fully, devote yourself to friendship, and trust others.

It’s true that if you dream big you might fall from dangerous heights. If you love fully, you may be hurt as a result. Trust can be betrayed and friendships can fall apart. Diving into life can unveil harsh truths. This is a very dangerous way to live; daunting, terrifying and thrilling. It is a goal of mine to live like this because I flatly reject living life void of feeling. I believe life is a gift. In order to appreciate it, one must experience every part.

The first time I ever killed a chicken was when I was 11 years old. For the past 4 years I have spent three weeks of my summer in Vermont attending an all-girls sleep away camp. At camp we grow most of our own food and at the end of the session we all sit down to harvest meal. The day before hand, the whole camp goes to the farm to harvest all the food that we have been growing. We also raise chickens. Campers have the opportunity to participate in the chicken harvest if they want to. I did. The farm hand, Beth, showed us how the process worked by demonstrating with the first chicken. Those of us who were still interested found partners and lined up after catching a chicken. I remember practicing my hatchet swing as we waited anxiously for our turn. I stepped up to the block as my partner extended the chicken’s neck between the pegs.

“I’m going to count to three,” Beth said “and then you’re going to chop here.” She pointed to the neck. Without any further notice she started counting, “One, Two, Three!” That was it; I didn’t have a moment to think about it, I just went with it and swung the hatchet. We proceeded to pluck it, gut it, and put it on ice for the meal. I have participated in this experience every year since. Chicken harvest isn’t exactly a beautiful process; in fact it’s quite messy, tense, and emotional for a lot of people. I chose to do it though, because it is a natural part of life and I want to experience every part of life, even if it scares me.

When I die, I want to have really really lived because I have no idea what happens next, not a clue. If there is a heaven or another life or anything beyond this one, then that would be great news! But just to play it safe, I’ll assume that all there is for sure is this life right now, the one I’m living. I believe that if this is indeed the only life I will get, I must jump at any experiences that will broaden my understanding of it. I’m going to do life right! And if I can do that, if I can take those risks, dance to my heart’s content, and see what there is to see, then when my time comes, I won’t be scared or full of regret.

You only live life once, but if you do it right, once is enough.