Overcome The Fear Of Death: A Beginner's Contemplation

A lot of us today may consider death as a bad thing. Examining some of the popular beliefs on death, we find what are the practical parts of death and surprisingly, the benefits of death. In this talk, we contemplate death and all that it brings. A good talk to listen to if you are not sure or you want to reframe how you think about death.

Trigger Warning: This practice may include references to death, dying, and the departed.

Transcript

Nowadays,

We think about death and consider everything that we see in the culturescape.

On television,

Movies,

We hear death is this horrible thing,

This tragic thing.

We're almost conditioned with all the media that we consume,

That when someone hears the news of a loved one dying,

They fall apart.

This horrible tragedy has occurred.

Now,

If we ask ourselves this question,

How do we understand death?

How should we think about death?

We need to examine some of these things.

For example,

Is that person really reacting to the news of the loved one dying,

In that they are mourning the loved one,

They are crying because the loved one has moved on,

Or are they mourning the absence that they will feel?

That loved one is no longer in their lives,

So it's a loss for them.

The human is a social animal,

In which case this suggests that actually when we mourn,

When we grieve with death,

We're mourning our loss,

The connection that we had,

That is now gone.

But the question is,

Is that person,

That experienced death,

Are they suffering in any way?

Is there pain for them?

These are the questions we need to ask ourselves.

Allowing ourselves to mourn,

There's nothing wrong with that,

But to consider that death is somehow a type of tragedy or a punishment to befall someone,

That's another question altogether.

The truth is,

Is that nobody knows what happens after we die.

There's no one who's died and come back and said,

Hey,

This is how it works.

And so a lot of what we believe happens after death is just an assumption.

We make assumptions based on different things,

And depending on the culture that you were raised in,

You will probably carry some of those assumptions.

For example,

If you were raised in a Christian household,

You have beliefs around the soul,

And so a lot of people who come out of cultures,

Even though they might not be Christian,

But if they're influenced in the same way,

They might still carry with them the beliefs about the soul,

Even though,

Even though they are no longer Christian anymore.

So the question around the soul is not just out of a Christian household,

Of course,

Remember that that also comes out of Buddhist and Hindu households as well,

The fact of reincarnation,

But we'll get back to that in a minute.

So the assumptions that we make about everything related to death are just that,

Assumptions,

Because we don't have any way to really examine it or experience it or listen to someone who has experienced death.

The closest to it that anyone could point at are people from the past,

Or maybe some strange phenomenon that might have been,

You know,

A friend of a friend or something like that,

But we can't validate it.

And if we can't validate it,

We just go with the general rules of what we know,

Right?

If there's an extreme thing,

It requires extreme evidence,

Right?

So if there is this promise of what happens after death,

It requires extreme evidence.

Now this is for logic,

But for the emotions,

Remember that humans crave to be romantic,

Connected to something bigger than ourselves as well.

So the belief of what happens after death is not necessarily a logical belief,

But rather it's a felt belief.

I want to feel that there is more after death.

I want to feel that life has a particular purpose and meaning and death in itself also has something for me.

So that's all fine.

So what are a couple of the assumptions of what happens after death?

Well,

There is the reward assumption,

You know,

We somehow go to heaven and we are rewarded for our deeds.

There is the punishment assumption,

Like we will be,

You know,

Sent to hell,

For example,

For our sins.

There is the reincarnation assumption as well,

Which we can see in a lot of Eastern traditions as well.

The idea that once we're done,

We reincarnate depending on our karma.

So it does depend on where you come from,

But all of these,

Again,

The reward,

The punishment,

You know,

Heaven,

Hell,

The reincarnation,

They all go with an assumption.

These cannot be validated by multiple groups of people.

These are just things that you're told and then you grow up thinking,

Oh,

Well,

That's the way it is.

So if you feel those things,

If you believe those things,

That's fine.

But being able to separate it out and say,

Well,

When a person dies,

I grieve for my loss,

I've lost someone in my life,

But where are they?

So if you do believe in reward,

Well,

They're being rewarded,

You know,

So there's no need to cry for them.

There's a need to cry for you to express your loss 100%,

But there's no need to cry for them,

Because where are they?

Well,

You know,

They're being rewarded,

They're up in heaven.

And if they're being punished in some way,

Then it's,

You know,

A belief that goes with that as well.

But my,

You know,

My thoughts are you probably won't be crying for someone who's being punished in hell.

But rather,

Like,

Even if someone had their shortcomings,

That they are still going to heaven in some way.

Now,

If you are a believer in reincarnation,

Then the simple thing about the death assumption is that you're not crying again for them,

Because they are being reincarnated.

They're almost being reset.

The Tibetan Book of the Dead actually talks about reincarnation as if it's a car wash,

Where the soul that's being reincarnated is a car.

And the journey,

The life that they have just experienced,

Is the journey that they've just taken.

And you can see it because there's all this dirt on the car.

Let's say it's a Jeep,

And it's done this off-road kind of journey,

And there's a lot of muck,

And,

You know,

Dust,

And dirt,

And mud.

And death is a car wash that wipes the experience,

The consciousness away from the soul,

And allows the soul another chance at life.

So again,

This person is wiped clean.

They don't remember their pain,

Their suffering,

Or anything like that,

And they're starting again.

So again,

There's no reason for you to feel that sadness on behalf of that person.

And the last one is the approach that death brings with it,

A nothingness,

Like a blackness.

It lights out.

And a lot of people might feel that that's a very sad way to think.

But think about it like this.

Every time you go to sleep,

And you black out,

You've lost consciousness.

There's nothingness.

Yes,

You may eventually start having a dream as well,

But between that dream state and awake state,

There is just a nothingness.

But how comforting is it?

How restful is it to be in that nothingness?

And all of a sudden,

We find ourselves actually enjoying the nothingness,

Or looking forward to the nothingness when we go to bed.

So there is this contemplation to consider,

Which is that even the nothingness is not a problem.

It means good rest,

Good rest.

Now when we think about the realities of death,

Let's tie these in.

There are a couple of realities of death.

When death happens,

Right?

So for a lot of people who live out their natural life,

And they start to approach death,

Let's say that there's a debilitating disease,

Some kind of chronic condition,

Or something like that.

Physically,

There's a lot of pain,

And death brings it a relief from that pain.

So there's this idea about the reality of death,

That it brings relief.

Now bringing relief from pain,

Physically,

Is one aspect of it.

But there could also be the mental aspect as well.

A lot of people,

When they reach the end of their lives,

They are tired,

They are frustrated,

They're angry.

Neuroplasticity is something that we have as children in buckets.

And as we get older,

We start to lose neuroplasticity,

And we start to crystallize our patterns,

Our nervous systems.

Now it takes a lot for us to challenge that by constantly learning and trying to grow and trying to change,

Which is wonderful.

But for those who were challenged with a life where that wasn't really an opportunity,

What does that mean?

Well,

It means that death brings with it an ultimate relief of,

I can relax.

I don't have to prove myself,

I don't have to be frustrated with anyone.

So that aspect of bringing relief.

Now the other aspect,

Another reality of death,

Is that death is part of the life cycle.

And let me phrase it another way,

Death cycles life.

So if we think about the lion,

The lion hunting,

The lion will hunt and kill the the buck,

The antelope.

And this is part of the life cycle.

Yes.

And that is where death comes in.

Obviously there is a part of a life cycle.

But the other consideration here is that if we had no death,

Then people who were older would get to control everything.

In that,

The older that you are,

And if there's no death,

Let's make an assumption and say that you don't get old in a debilitating way,

But rather you just get old and older and older,

But you can still physically do all the things.

There would be such an accumulation of wealth for one person,

Power for one person.

And you think about how there's an accumulation of wealth in like the top 1% at the moment that people talk about,

That people may be frustrated with,

Because wealth is passed down in families at the moment.

But imagine what that would look like if it was an individual.

So death cycles life.

It allows people to actually move on and in that space a redistribution of resources,

A redistribution of power,

And also it gives the opportunity for new younger people to come in,

To control situation scenarios,

Organizations,

Families,

Etc.

And actually choose new directions.

There's a famous quote that says that science progresses with every death.

And it came from this idea that Charles Darwin introduced his theory of evolution,

And the people that were his age and who had already been educated like university age and above,

Rejected his idea because it spoke against the things that they already held to be true.

Whereas the younger generations that came in,

They actually started learning about it,

And to them being presented with this new concept made more sense than the old concept.

They were happy to discard the old ones.

So it's easier for people to discard old beliefs the younger that they are.

And so with the cycle of life we can also cycle out old beliefs.

So it's just that concept.

Remember if we think about someone a hundred years ago,

How they would have treated their neighbors,

Or how they would have treated,

You know,

Anyone who wasn't their equal,

How they would have treated someone handicapped,

Or spoken about someone with a disability.

So that concept of cycling beliefs is a reality about death as well.

And the final one,

The final reality about death is,

Let's say if we talk about something tragic,

Like a car crash that cuts the life of someone who's very young,

Short,

You know,

Cancers,

Attacking babies,

Things like that.

These things as well show us symptoms in the environment,

Symptoms of the system that we have in place for us to resolve.

And so that death wasn't in vain.

It allowed future generations to benefit.

So if it was a drunk driver that gets taken off the road,

That drunk driver doesn't get to enact their cycles of self-destruction upon their environment anymore because that one drunk driver got taken off the road.

Or if it's traffic laws,

If they were implemented,

Or if it was a murderer that was caught.

All of these things are symptoms of the environment.

Each one of these things is symptomatic of multiple things that created it.

And with every death there is stronger and stronger resolution to solve and fix this particular problem.

And so future generations will benefit from this death as well.

The final point is on this with symptoms,

Is that death leaves it opportunity in its wake.

So I'm going to share a personal story to actually exemplify this.

My brother was a heroin addict for 10 years and slowly but surely he was cut off from family members.

You know,

Different family members cut him off.

They didn't want anything to do with him because he was stealing from them,

Lying to them,

You know,

Taking advantage of them.

And eventually he then got clean from heroin,

But then it was alcohol that was the next thing.

By the time that he got clean,

Nobody wanted anything to do with him because of the abuse that had gone on for over 10 years.

Now he had been already two or three years sober.

He had gotten married and was coming back to a situation where my father had passed away.

And he didn't know how anyone would accept him or face him or anything like that.

And it was in that moment of death that people's attitudes softened.

Because death brings it a perspective,

What's important in life.

And seeing my brother healed,

Seeing my brother dealing with his addictions and being responsible and trying to to live a good life,

People then changed their opinions.

And two months later we celebrated his wedding with the family,

That side of the family,

And it was a real healing experience for the entire family.

Because it was an opportunity to cast off the death,

The sadness that was around that as well,

And to celebrate life,

To celebrate new beginnings as well.

And so death leaves with it opportunities in its wake for two things.

Number one,

For us to soften,

Soften decisions,

Soften resolve that we had previously made to protect ourselves by questioning and asking ourselves what's truly important.

And secondly the opportunity to to actually celebrate what life is as well.

This has been the beginner's guide for how to think about death.

I hope that you've enjoyed it.

If you've enjoyed this premium track,

Then please check out the other courses that are up here on Insight Timer.

Who knows,

You may enjoy them.

If you enjoyed this very much,

Please feel free to leave a five-star review with your thoughts.

What did I miss as well?

I'd love to hear it from you.

Take care.

Reviews

You gave a great summary and new ideas about death and the positives it can bring. I love the topic of death but there are few around who can enjoy engaging in the subject. Personally i want to embrace death when it comes my way so I am preparing my life and my mind.

Great track.
As a former nurse in the palliatief care i learned a lot. It took away my fear of death.
It made me appreciate life even more.
Thank you for this track.

Interesting insights are shared about our individual transcience can benefit the greater good