Today, Dec. 14, marks the 10th anniversary of Josh Freeman’s sudden passing. On this important day, Michelle Freeman wanted to share some thoughts about her late husband:

“The Freeman family is so grateful for the incredible support and encouragement since the passing of Josh in 2006. Josh believed each person is unique with their own special qualities. I’d like to think that what we have accomplished in his name continues to build upon his legacy. A beautiful characteristic of my husband was his personal commitment to ‘pay it forward.’ If anyone would like to do anything in his remembrance today, ‘pay it forward’ in any way that you see fit. He would have loved that.”

Michelle thought that it may be fitting to also share Josh’s favorite poem, “If” by Rudyard Kipling, which he would often recite:

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!