When I saw my father on the Sunday afternoon I just knew it was going to be the last time I would be with him. It was a feeling I hadn't had before but I knew that sadly I was right.

That Sunday afternoon as I sat with him in the hospice I wanted to say everything to him. I wanted to share with him again the childhood memories we had had together and the memories we had with my mother and brothers. The memories I knew he cherished. The walks we went on together. The people he had known. Everything. But although we made eye contact and I'm sure he smiled, he couldn't talk and I was not sure if he could hear or understand what I said.

His illness had been progressive over about 12 years. The person he had become was not the person he once was. But that wasn't important as I always thought of my father as the person he was before he became ill.

When the call came a few days later to tell me he had passed away I was sad but in a strange way relieved that his suffering was over.

I don't as a rule tolerate regret as an emotion. But when I put the phone down I regretted never having really spoken to him about his thoughts, his life when he was young. I regretted never really seeking his advice on everyday things. When my father first became ill I was in my mid-twenties and like many at that age I was a little too self-absorbed. So my loss was also that I never really got to know my father as well as I could.

In my professional life I have given many speeches and find them easy. But when I was asked to write and deliver the eulogy for my father at his funeral I had to think and think very deeply. How would we as a family and everyone who knew my father remember him?

The words soon came to mind - kindness, good humour, willingness to help others.

My mother and my two brother each had prominent memories:

The wonderful story-teller when we were children. How he would get us excited and hold us in suspense as he would tell us the stories he made up filled with imaginary characters.

His great lover of the outdoors. How when we were young he would take us on walks in the country and on the coast.

His great sense of humour and laughter. How on one occasion he had my friends in stitches of laughter, what about I cant remember. I just recall the laughter.

My fathers love of sports. And how once when I went a run with him he had to slow down to allow me to keep up with him, although with our age gap it should have been the other way round.

But we all will always have clear memories of his kindness, good humour and willingness to help others.

With these and other memories I wrote my father's Eulogy.

It was one of the saddest, but also one of the proudest days of my life when I delivered my father's Eulogy at his funeral.

How will you be remembered?

This is the question I posed to myself. It made me reflect on my career. Was I really doing what I enjoyed most? This provided me with the stimulus to start-up my own business helping others achieve their true potential.

In years to come how would you like to be remembered? As someone who is warm, sharing, honest and fun to be with or as someone who worked 70 hours a week with no time for family and friends? Reflect on this question. If necessary adjust the balance in the various areas of your life - the time you spend on your interests, your holidays, your friends, your family, your work, your health, your material possessions.

Think now, "How do I want to be remembered?" and start living that life today.