In most discussion/debate about life and death these terms are usually treated as separate events. While in a practical sense this may seem true given the passage of time generally between these two events the real truth about life and death is that they are intrinsically connected and part of the same eternal process. One cannot exist without the other.
To live life fully we must also embrace the imminence of death and to easily accept and surrender to death we must have embraced and lived an authentically full life.
If we don’t accept that some day we will physically cease to exist then we may end up wasting our life and we may not truly appreciate the wonders and opportunities presented to us during our life and on our death bed struggle with what is a natural transition between the continual unending process of death and birth.
One of the biggest barriers to our embracing this process is the development of the ego “I”. It is interesting that as we are born and grow we start to clothe our psyche’s in the dust of all our experiences. Soon we no longer see the real us and only see the separate identity we have created for ourselves. The ego fears death above all things. Consequently, we tend to avoid facing the issue of death seeing it as some uncertain thing in the distant future. Our ego drives us to seek security and certainty to assuage this fear. Of course the stronger our ego the more frightened we are.
In reality we face death every day with every breath we take. Breathing in is renewal and breathing out is ex-hilation. Life is constantly changing around us – old leaves fall off tress, flowers shrivel and die, our skin flakes and dies, our hair falls out and so on….. Death and renewal are instrinsically linked. They are opposite poles of the same process – one cannot happen without the other.
This reminds me of an old story I heard about a statue of Buddha which after centuries of neglect had been coated in and covered by an outer crust of mud and other debris. The temple in which the statue was situated had been subject to much desarcration over the years by invading hordes. However, the statue had remained intact no doubt due to its unremarkable and dirty appearance. Some centuries later on cleaning the statue a monk discovered that after peeling away part of the outer crust he found hidden beneath the true gold that the statue had been made of which had remained hidden. This statue was beneath its outer facade a truly wonderous and valuable thing of beauty! Each day of our life can be a real thing of beauty!
We become over a period of time much like the statue. Our outer crust separates us from our true “golden”essence. This crust has not been consciously made by us and hides our real treasure which is that we are eternal spiritual beings having a human experience.
Imagine if we all lived each day as if it were our last. What would that be like? Would you waste one minute doing things that you don’t enjoy? Would you cram as much as you could into each day and go to bed feeling tired but totally satisfied?
Lets try living as if today is the last day we spend in this human experience. Make a list of how you would spend that day and then choose one day every month for the next 6 months and do what is on that list and see how different you feel about your life. Imagine what it would be life to live like that every day. It wouldn’t then matter how long you lived because you will have truly lived life as a great adventure.