I wish you a long life full of meaning and purpose.
I hope while you're in this life as we know it,
You connect to something greater than yourself.
I hope you live a life of spiritual abundance,
And I hope that when that abundance culminates in your dying,
That you do so with a full heart and a full spirit.
None of us knows what happens after death.
Religions have theorized on death and the afterlife for millennia.
You might have visions of heaven or hell or variations thereof.
You might be into reincarnation or resurrection.
I find these ideas fascinating,
And still,
The best I can say at this point,
The middle of my life,
Is I just don't know what happens when I die.
Indeed,
I am very intrigued.
I would love to know.
I don't intend to hurry along the process,
But because death is so intriguing to me,
At this point in my life,
I don't fear it.
So I am a little confused by our response to this pandemic.
I don't wish to wade into political territory here,
But I'll just say I'm intrigued by how willing we are to significantly change our lives so the elderly,
Those most at risk of death from this disease,
Might live another X number of months or years.
Where I live,
The average age of death from COVID is 83 years old,
And life expectancy for men is only 80 years old and 85 for women.
It seems to me,
And I may well be missing something,
That death is just such a fear-inducing prospect that we're willing to take drastic measures to avoid it or delay it.
Indeed,
I hope your death is far in the future.
And I also hope that when it comes,
You'll take that journey with courage,
Love,
And hope.
I hope that when it is your time to participate in the dying process,
That you do it with vigor and abundance,
And clarity of mind.
So what better time to start,
Or continue,
Preparing for your own death than right now?
We can't live this life to the fullest unless we have some concept of what happens after,
Or the significance may well be left behind.
So I invite you to join this journey to uncover your beliefs about death.
My hope is that this visualization will help give the clarity you might need whenever it is your time to leave this life as we know it.
I'm going to go for a walk,
And you might come for a walk also,
Or you might just stay where you are.
Shall we go on this journey?
It's foggy where I am,
And that seems apropos given the lack of clarity I have around death.
And there's something about the fog that invites curiosity and wonder.
It invites intrigue.
So that's apropos also.
Let's consider three points in time.
And let's imagine time is linear.
That's how we experience it,
Even though that might not actually be how it is,
But we experience it that way.
The first point in time is the moment of your death.
It's the moment of your last breath.
It's the moment the blood stops flowing to your brain,
And life as we define it in your body has come to an end.
As I'm describing this,
What feelings arise for you?
What sensations in the body,
In your body,
Have changed?
Has anything in your posture changed?
Have some muscles become more or less tense?
Paying attention to these is good.
Our bodies offer us insight into our own thoughts and feelings.
There's a range of feelings that would be considered normal as one considers the prospect of their own death.
And what are the feelings that are happening for you?
What do you imagine to be the circumstances of your own dying?
Where are you?
Who is there?
How has it happened?
How painful do you suppose it was?
What feelings do you imagine now that the version of you that is just dying is feeling?
So not what feelings are you feeling now,
But what feelings do you imagine yourself experiencing at the time of death?
Let's move along the timeline.
So if the point of your dying is at some point in the future,
Let's come a little bit closer to the present.
Maybe a short time before the moment of your death.
How do you imagine that version of yourself feeling about your life thus far?
What does this older version of yourself think about your life?
How satisfied is that version of yourself?
What highlights of your life stand out to that future version of yourself just before death?
These highlights might be things that have actually already happened for you,
Or they might be things that you imagine happening between now and this point in time that you're imagining.
Consider two or three highlights that you imagine the future version of yourself reflecting upon.
We've considered the moment of your death,
Sometime not long before your death,
And now let's move to sometime after your death.
What do you imagine is happening then?
What is around this future version of yourself after you have died?
Are there sensations this future version of yourself experiences?
What do you,
At this moment,
Feel when you reflect upon that version of yourself after your own death?
Are you comfortable with how you imagine that time after your death?
What degree of certainty do you feel about that time after your death?
And perhaps most importantly,
What is it you wish to change about your life now,
Such that you feel comfort and peace and abundance at all three phases,
At your death,
Just before your death,
And after your death?
What is it about your life that you need to stop doing?
What is it you need to start doing?
What is it that you do now that you need to do more of for that sense of abundance?
And what is it you do now that you need to do less of for that sense of abundance?
There is indeed so much to consider with regards to your own death.
I hope that time doesn't come for a long time,
But I hope that when it does come,
You will have found meaning and purpose and connection to something greater than yourself.
May you know equanimity,
May you know abundance,
And may you know peace.
Until next time,
I'm Greg.
Peace.
