I wept when I read your email. I am also afraid of death. When I imagine the moment that my body fails me and I see the world fading, I wonder if those who claim fearlessness can imagine as vividly. To be truly fearless requires a great deal of wisdom and often, at first, suffering through a great deal of terror.
It is the moment of ending that terrifies me. I day dream about the faces of the dyeing clenched in resistance, the sobs of “not wanting” or solemn expressions of hopelessness. I imagine unique manifestations of the same dread, spoken by the bodies of strangers and loved ones in their dyeing moments, who are longing to be cradled like small children retreating to their mother’s breast. And I wonder what I could do for them, because I could not tell them everything was going to be okay.
I wish that I could save myself and everyone I love from such a terrible fate.
This is a difficult topic to breach and very helpful to both of us, not only to weaken our resistance to the inescapable but because death is so powerful that the very thought of it is enough to clear our minds, and let everything of no importance fall away.
My experience with it has shifted my path irrevocably and I would suggest to you in great earnestness that when the opportunity to meet death as a teacher presents itself hang on, go deeper into your aloneness; even in your most desperate moments when comfort beckons you so forcefully that you would take it in any form, withstand the temptation and allow death to transform you. Death is a gift, a window into life, and it is easily forgotten.
There is not much I can say to you about acceptance of death; only that I know that true acceptance would mean that there was no suffering in it. It is true that the only thing to fear is fear itself and that the power of death can release that insight from its cliché veneer. And in saying all of this I wonder if I really know what I am saying. In the presence of death I know nothing. I know absolutely nothing. And in this state I feel at home.
It is the moment of ending that terrifies me. I day dream about the faces of the dyeing clenched in resistance, the sobs of “not wanting” or solemn expressions of hopelessness. I imagine unique manifestations of the same dread, spoken by the bodies of strangers and loved ones in their dyeing moments, who are longing to be cradled like small children retreating to their mother’s breast. And I wonder what I could do for them, because I could not tell them everything was going to be okay.
I wish that I could save myself and everyone I love from such a terrible fate.
This is a difficult topic to breach and very helpful to both of us, not only to weaken our resistance to the inescapable but because death is so powerful that the very thought of it is enough to clear our minds, and let everything of no importance fall away.
My experience with it has shifted my path irrevocably and I would suggest to you in great earnestness that when the opportunity to meet death as a teacher presents itself hang on, go deeper into your aloneness; even in your most desperate moments when comfort beckons you so forcefully that you would take it in any form, withstand the temptation and allow death to transform you. Death is a gift, a window into life, and it is easily forgotten.
There is not much I can say to you about acceptance of death; only that I know that true acceptance would mean that there was no suffering in it. It is true that the only thing to fear is fear itself and that the power of death can release that insight from its cliché veneer. And in saying all of this I wonder if I really know what I am saying. In the presence of death I know nothing. I know absolutely nothing. And in this state I feel at home.
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