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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/5/2008 10:56:16 AM | | The Tibetan book of living and dying is a wonderful book.I agree Eastern beliefs have a much more accepting, realistic view of death.I believe that true living requires that we be our authentic selves, by doing the things we really enjoy.Wearing the clothes that we find comfortable and most like ourselves.Listen to music that truly moves us and touches our heart.Trust our bodies to tell us what to eat , rather stick to some crazy diet.When we are relaxed and our real selves we attract the right people into our lives, when we drop the ego and are real.Learning to leave our ego out of our everyday lives ,is very important, as when we do, we no longer see our self image or appearance as the centre of the universe. When we take the attention of ourselves, we can look at the universe and be filled with awe. Ask why the sky is blue or the moon silver.No longer read magazines about how to be beautiful , young or sexy. Know in your soul you are beautiful because you exist. We can enjoy life and stop criticizing and judging ourselves.We need never opologise for who we really are or how we genuinely feel. Real living means we can love with out expectation of return, knowing it is not our fault , when people act erratically, that is their choice, no blaming others, taking personal responsibility for choices and mistakes, being empowered, not a victim. Death is the end of a life well lived, as who we are, as individuals. We fall like a luscious apple ripe from a tree, full of beauty and goodness, leaving the seeds our uniqueness to the world. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/5/2008 11:59:17 AM |
When we are relaxed and our real selves we attract the right people into our lives,
Yes and for the right reasons.
Know in your soul you are beautiful because you exist.
And this in and of itself brings it's own freedom.
Almost like an unveiling of the inner you.
A release from the physical in a sense, as it transcends the body.
It enables you to not only seek but see that incredible beauty in others.
We can enjoy life and stop criticizing and judging ourselves.
And others as well.
At the same time, the criticism and judgements against you become infinitesimal.
THAT is total acceptance, not just of yourself, but of others as well.
No expectations, unrealistic or otherwise, placed on another is freeing.
You are no longer disappointed when they fail to materialize.
We become grateful in the moment for what most assuredly does transpire.
They give of themselves not because it is expected, but because they want to.
Gratitude takes on so much more meaning, when another shares with you openly out of want, not need.
Real living means we can love with out expectation of return
Is this not what true giving is ?
Expecting otherwise is more of a trade than a gift.
And what better gift to freely give yourself and the world ?
That of unconditional love and acceptance !  | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/5/2008 1:41:25 PM | We all have so many walls that keep us locked in, walls of pain and fear. We need to transcend those walls and ignore them , rise above them and live our lives fully.Walls keep out pain but lock in fear and doubt. they also lock out love and happiness.The book "The four agreements" talks about the folly of self importance.It is self importance that makes us think that everything said and done is somehow personal to us as individuals.To get angry at a bad driver for example is self importance its about him not us. The common misconception is that self importance is arrogance or egotism, and while that could be true to an extent, self importance is more an underlying defensiveness, that prevents a person from embracing clarity and power because he is so busy defending himself, when there is nothing to defend in the first place.It ain't personal full stop.Its a mindset really a way of thinking, a state of awareness from which we form our ideas of reality.What is real and fantasy e.g we know while we are awake, we cannot fly ,but when asleep, in our dreams, we can do anything.In dreams there are no parameters of reality, all is possible.By changing our mindset about the parameters of reality, we can often change the limitations, that stop us from growing and expanding as individuals or as a species.A lot of information is programmed into us through school etc and we accept it as truth.We need to prove or disprove these facts for ourselves as individuals.We are taught that all things die, and this appears to be true,people accept the fact, rather than doing their own quest for knowledge, into the veracity or falseness of the statement itself.In reality we cannot know for certain that all things die,we can only know what our perceptions reveal to us within our immediate environment.By altering our perceptions,
thereby altering our expectations, we see that a lot of what we know about the world is actually what we believe.When we accept things blindly, we stop questioning and exploring other possibilities.if the Wright bros had said "men cannot fly " well we would have a different world now.Never stop exploring the possibilities of life and death.Life is for living and exploring and learning and death teaches us not to miss that opportunity. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/5/2008 4:24:51 PM | When someone dies and leaves you with feelings of guilt because of things left undone or unsaid, they do teach you something. They teach you to be less complacent, more appreciative and hopefully a better person. They teach you that you shouldn't live within yourself and particpate in life and love more deeply and live more fully. No one is the center of the universe, the proverbial "no man is an island".
Death teaches us a lot. But like all teachers it still relies heavily on the student as to how well the lessons can or will be learned. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/5/2008 9:18:33 PM | | The vehicle through which we are co-experiencing this planet today may no longer function, but consciousness is eternal. Death is an opportunity to compare what we aspired to experience in this co-created reality before being born to that which we did experience. If we have grown our understanding enough to move on to other experiences we do, otherwise we return for another go. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/6/2008 11:15:51 AM | | Our death is something which'll occur as clouds roll by, the sun shines, the birds sing, cars pass, children play in the yard, people take dumps, have sex, break up, make up, and it's all good; even the tears and the anger. I'm most definitely not gonna throw myself to the floor and proclaim my love for everyone and everything because that's contrived living. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/6/2008 5:07:31 PM |
Awareness of death helps us to appreciate the on going journey of light, that is life.
That's an interesting view. Though I am not sure why I should appreciate something I didn't ask for... but that is another conversation.
Once I asked my friend why he doesn't want to talk about death and he replied, "Cause it scares the shit out of me".
There is a great deal of people who fear death. The result is often anxiety, and to a certain extend a sheltered life. That is, the fear of death prevents us from living life to the fullest... at least so for many. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/6/2008 5:22:12 PM | There is a great deal of people who fear death.
Yes, I agree. It is likely more accurate to say the majority.
Some fear it so intensely they tend to avoid the infirm.
That is, the fear of death prevents us from living life to the fullest
This, in my opinion, is an irrational fear.
I think we, North Americans especially, view dying as the enemy.
Modern medicine can and does keep many alive well past their expiration date.
Death is part of life and should be viewed as such.
One need only be present when another passes to see the beauty and peacefulness to it.
There are things worse than dying, and in some cases, that is living. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/6/2008 8:15:07 PM | | Only those who are truly alive have no fear of death. Thus, it seems, our degree of fear is inversely proportional to the effort invested in attempting to live. There are those who shine with meaning and purpose and those who have turned to stone, the rest of us are fettered in the spectrum of the safe-zone, the realm of the shackled breathing dead. This majority, myself not excluded, are akin to somewhat pleasant looking pacified zombies, dimly unaware that taking this or that chance might radically alter an otherwise semi-miserable existence. Of course we all have our moments but why settle for occasional trickles from sea of life. We ought to take more calculated risks, kick more bricks in the wall, it might come tumbling down but instead of being drowned we just might find ourselves afloat in unforeseen dignity. Life can be long or short depending on the perspective but death, like birth, is but a moment. Life can be loaded with lessons while death has only one, the most encompassing of all, it teaches us to truly live. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 10:30:53 AM | | Anyone who has ever seen the series Six Feet under will know see, in very funny format, the spin we put on death.Embalming, make up and best suit make for a happy looking corpse.People remark how happy/ peaceful the body looks. .Denial is rife at all times during the proceedings and we are all glad it wasn,t us.The great Herrick poem "Death the Leveller" describes how both King and pauper come to the same end. Death is the ultimate equalizer.Western culture sanitizes death , until it is almost invisible. Not just swept under the carpet but the floor boards too.People live to acquire stuff, they will never use and use life like a rehearsal, when it is the real thing.Afraid to love/ commit and take risks.It is true we cannot love everyone, but we can act with love. Along with our actions comes, a choice. To act with hostility or kindness.When life is short, why not live it, as our real selves and with self respect. Why be filled with anxiety or fear, if someone says no, don't take it personally, move on with good wishes.No is part of life as is yes. Take risks, give love and forgive slights large and small.Life is for living and choosing and loving.. ,to fulfill our own personal purpose, why not do it. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 12:53:33 PM | | being a naturalist, i tend to look at the other animals that live on our planet which allow us to pose questions on our very design... all animals have the basic and intrinsic goal to pass their genes on and often die after reproducing their progeny... one of the remarkable examples is the salmon... and after death. the chum, coho and chinook varieties are fed on by bears and when they decay after being dragged into the woods ('tis a bloody end') they help regenerate the forest and marine elements can be traced in the trees that grow in the riparian zones..... there are two messages here that by passing on our genes our soul lives on and also that with death comes rebirth, all part of the fundamental cyclicity of things...... by understanding that death is a natural process and through death we help regeneration and birth, we should understand it should not be a symbol of finality... | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 1:58:20 PM | "Life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease." ~ Unknown
I like to think more about time and how we spend it. A south park episode made a joke about one of the boys who was in the hospital for surgery, "I'm sorry, but your son is running out of time; we need to do a time transplant right now! But we have no time." Because death and life are only periods of time. Though I guess people enjoy (or not) thinking about their impending doom (or death).
I guess the moral of the story is to enjoy what time you have until we can find a cure for Life. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 2:31:27 PM | A cure for life  I love it.So many people are unhappy and seem to need an antidote for life. Is death such a good alternative?.Is it a case of we don't know what we got till its gone, oops too late. Why wait for illness or death itself to strike. Get high on life I say. Walk in the woods, watch the birds nest, .Walk on the beach and observe the power of the ocean.Sit in a leafy tree and inhale the energy of the earth and its bounty. Fill up to overflowing and give away the surplus for the joy of it.So life is crap sometimes, we get hurt, get our hearts broken, are poor or broken.But hey to get to feel love is a gift and real love never hurts, as we give it not to receive, but just because we can.We crave approval from our fellow travelers in strife, why? they are as flawed as us and struggling too.We judge though we can hardly afford to, being far from perfect ourselves.We put on masks, cloaks, put up walls of fear and try to blend in / fit in.Dont be different or unusual, quirky or individual. Why not ! different is good, its unique. I never want to fit in or join the crowd, I always want to be me, no matter what.I know life cyclical and our turn will come, as in nature, That is how it should be, the natural order of things and so the cycle continues and death is part of that circle. Perhaps part of my DNA will be found in a tree in years to come, after falling off while sitting on a weak branch. Dead at its root , I will decay and become part of it. Hmm could be worse, I could have the makeup and the lead coffin and rictus smile.Botox and death have much in common. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 3:10:01 PM | You state a wonderful case OP, but the majority travel their journey terrified of what the 'neighbours may think'. 
I find it to be a sad, hollow existence. I agree with your philosophy to be yourself. To me quirky is wonderful. It signifies a strong sense of self. I'm very much drawn to these types.
We put on masks, cloaks, put up walls of fear and try to blend in / fit in.
This is why I LOVE spending my time with the children and seniors.
The children have yet to figure out they are not like everyone else and are simply themselves. So full of life and excited just to be. Their brutal honesty is hilarious and refreshing. To them there is no right and wrong, there just is. It seems to begin to change once they start school.
On the other end of the scale the elderly ( esp. those dying) are beginning to drop their lifelong masks. I find this to be an exhilerating time for them and for myself. It is mixture of joy and sorrow. To think that they spent the bulk of their life in a pretense is saddening.
I knew one woman who would come out with the most comical statements at the most inappropriate times. She was not senile by any stretch. She as she put it 'had all her marbles'. I would spend hours laughing at and with her, enjoying every minute of it. I asked her, close to the end, if she had always thought these things and just not expressed them. Her response will stay with me always ...'Yup. What the heII have I got to lose now ?'
Sad that her little corner of the world lost out on one of most wonderful senses of humour that I have ever encountered. For what ?? Not fear of death, but fear of being judged.
You are a very wise young woman OP to have figured out what most never discover. The right and obligation to yourself to be you. After all, what the heII have you got to lose ?
True happiness, contentment and even health are contingent on this.  | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 6:01:46 PM | every thing and every one is our teacher......and our student.....all connected, just like birth and death are completely connected in the whole journey of life.
living in the moment, in 'the now' has been a teaching and lesson by many. it is naturally part of the process of becoming conscious and aware....aware of everything. living life or death in fear will close one's awareness.
itsma - sending love and gratitude for sharing your memory. your father was right, as much as it hit to realize his truth. he was a great teacher. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/8/2008 6:32:02 PM | Some of us test death...see how far we can push it.
I spend time with people who are terminally ill. There is an intensity to their lives that most of us don't experience. When they pass I try to take the imprint of their memory and compress it like a diamond.
Then I walk around with that jewel and it's illumination in my pocket.
Everyone I have lost is still with me.
Death is transient, its not final. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 12:34:36 AM | Hey OP, I can see what you're saying, I think(when I can), maybe a better description
may be that death is an invaluable advisor. Treat each and every action everyday as if it were your last act in life, in other words, like you said, make every second count!!
Do everything (that you do), to the utmost best that you can muster, for it may be the last thing you get to do in this passionplay. I guess here would go the part about not putting things off also.
My brother passed from HIV related probs. He told me that after he found out that he was pos. [ he got to live the usual (at that time), 10 years],that his priorities got a huge rearrangement. Advised by the imminent/inevitable looming in on him, not that he knew which day he would pass, but no amount of rationalizing could put off the fact.
Have you read any of the Castaneda books, I wonder?
As John Lennon put it," You can't live a life until you die!"
Oh well just a small slice of my ramblings, good thread!
SHANTI | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 2:38:08 AM | I think we labour under a certain number of illusions when it comes to these kinds of questions.
We can learn, not so much from death itself, but rather from our awareness that death constitutes our ultimate end and, in that sense, our ultimate possibility insofar as all of our possibilities (which is what life essentially is) are ringed by the inevitability of death. The temporal limits of our existence determine in all kinds of ways the manner in which we live and the way in which life is shaped in advance for us.
Questions concerning the possibility of an afterlife cannot be settled in debates and dicussions here or anywhere else. That is not to disparage anyone's particular belief set. Rather, the whole faith versus reason debate makes absolutely no sense BY DEFINITION. If there were sound reasons and good evidence for believing in a supreme being or an afterlife, then there would be no NEED for faith since we would have good reasons for belief. Faith by definition means unquestioning confidence even without such 'evidence'. Theists actually undermine and contradict the very articles of their own religious creeds when they try and offer rational arguments in support of their beliefs. The whole point is to have faith when no such evidential framework is available. So again, these kinds of debates are ultimately nonsensical.
What we can discuss is how we are affected in the here and now, which means that we cannot talk about what we would learn from no longer being in the now, since we would no longer be there to learn from it as what we are now. All we can talk about is what we may learn about ourselves from our constant lurking antinipation of the horizon which sits at the edge of all our futures, namely, our awareness that one day we will no longer be. In short, think about it this way, what do we learn about the things that matter to us from the fact that we know that we do not live forever. If we knew that we were immortal and were going to be creatures without end on earth for all eternity, would it affect the way we look on what we want and who we want and when we want them??? | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 4:19:38 AM | "Western culture sanitizes death , until it is almost invisible."
I think it is true in Western culture we try to avoid death as much as possible, especially through frenetic activities. Martin Heidegger wrote some insightful commentary when he talked about our obsession with trying to 'run away' from death or 'covering it up' by putting it into public discourse. Heidegger also talked a lot about how in facing up to death we move from inauthenticity (a term used to describe a form of life where you are not true to your deepest self and its possibilities) to authenticity, if we accept the reality of death and how it connects to life, contingency, necessity, existential choices in the face of death, and freedom. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 4:30:13 AM | It's important to distinguish in Heidegger however between what we might call biological and biographical death on the one hand and existential death, he is not actually interested in the process of death itself AT ALL, merely the way our anticipation of our ultimate possibility even liminally is constitutive of our awareness.
It is also important to recognize that the discussion of authenticity in Being and Time is not an existentialist ethic. He is very explicit about this. You make Heidegger sound like a thoroughgoing existentialist (and a humanist in that Sartrean sense) and he is very clearly moving away from any resonance or residue of the expressivist movement or ego-based metaphysics in Being and Time. The discussion of death is really a part of a larger question concerning the underlying constitutive features of existence which point toward the temporal character of existence. Choice and resolve in Heidegger are not part of some existential concrete springboard to authentic action. This is one of the most distressing misreadings of Heidegger's magnum opus that has prevailed since the 1930's with the like of Lowith and Marcuse reading the accounts of authenticity and inauthenticity in just this way. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 5:55:48 AM | | Here's a thought on the concept of an 'afterlife', we can believe whatever we wish but what do we know for certain? The answer is nothing. I personally find it pleasingly ironic that this iconic question can be disarmed by such a simple resolution. Of course we live on in the memory of the living, our offspring, our deeds but why do we feel the need to believe in theories of which there can never be proof? At the risk of sounding morbid perhaps we ought to credit death with an established position in consciousness rather than diluting its import in abstractions. Then, when deliberating choices, we would have a powerful ally to combat the potential adversary of regretted, unlived life. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 6:58:22 AM | "It is also important to recognize that the discussion of authenticity in Being and Time is not an existentialist ethic. He is very explicit about this. You make Heidegger sound like a thoroughgoing existentialist (and a humanist in that Sartrean sense) and he is very clearly moving away from any resonance or residue of the expressivist movement or ego-based metaphysics in Being and Time. The discussion of death is really a part of a larger question concerning the underlying constitutive features of existence which point toward the temporal character of existence."
It has been a while since I've read Heidegger, so if I have misread him on some of the finer points, I welcome correction. Even so, I am aware he placed some distance between himself and Sartre's ideas. | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 7:06:59 AM | | Again, this is to invite a'faith v reason' debate which just does not make sense. The fact that I find the belief of theists implausible, for example, proves nothing beyond that, either positively or negatively. Far be it from any of us however to disparage the strength of faith that certain people hold in what they have taken to be divine revelation. The whole point is that faith exists outside of and beyond the scope of reason. If it did not, then it would have to abide by the strictures of reason which you look to apply. It does not, it chooses not to (even if certain theists have denied or have not realized this), it is IRRATIONAL. I can offer a thousand reasons as to why religious beliefs do not make rational sense, however, the whole idea of someone's "faith" (and I must admit, this is something that I just really don't get) is that their conviction can withstand all of those doubts. They choose to believe in something that quite simply makes a beggar out of reasonable belief and confounds anything we could posit as being plausible...It's a kind of madness to be sure, some might call it a divine madness, but if someone chooses to believe, for example, in the tooth fairy there is absolutely no ultimate demonstration that their belief is false. It just does not belong in the arena of rational inquiry... | |
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| Is death rather than life our teacher
Posted: 4/9/2008 7:16:21 AM | "It has been a while since I've read Heidegger, so if I have misread him on some of the finer points, I welcome correction. Even so, I am aware he placed some distance between himself and Sartre's ideas."
Fair enough, though it is not really a question of finer points in the trivial sense, the reading of authenticity is absolutely vital to the success of Heidegger's project in Being and Time.
Heidegger didn't actually feel the need to distance himself from Sartre until the publication of his Letter on Humanism two decades later. The letter is ostensibly a response to Beaufret who wanted to press Heidegger to restore some meaning or significance to the notion of humanism. The letter was written to Heidegger on the back of Sartre's rather famous lecture in Paris designed to defend and popularize existentialism which was subsequently published under the title "Existentialism is a Humanism" among others. Heidegger responds to Beaufret, and implicitly Sartre, keen to distance himself from the kind of existentialist humanism of Sartre with the concomitant notion of radical freedom centred in an isolated, solipsistic, Cartesian subject. This again was a version of exisence based philosophy which Heidegger had eschewed in Being and Time and which he continued to distance himself from ever more agressively throughout his career. | |
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