Manila, March 27 -- There is a new Netflix series called, "3 Body Problem" with a protagonist that could somehow see a digital countdown that no one else can. In one episode, the said protagonist is told that she would not want it to get to zero. Although it was never revealed what would happen if the countdown went to zero, some viewers assumed that the end of the countdown would coincide with death. It got me wondering how people would act differently if we all had an internal countdown that would tell us how long we have left to live. Perhaps, with a continuing reminder of our mortality, we would all take stock of our lives and focus on what is really important.

We may not have these internal countdown meters but, every year we are g...