The beauty of death
8 believes & ideas I have about death & how to handle it, to live a fullfilling life.
I feel very vulnerable and even a bit insane to have decided to write this headline.
And I will not change it (I am just starting to write today’s newsletter & will stay with this headline until the end, when I press “publish”).
But just to clarify for those of you who wonder: I speak about the natural death that we all face; that one fact of our lifes, that no one can escape from. That death.
Three days ago, my uncle died. Suddenly.
My family & I sat in the car, it started snowing.
The atmosphere changed, got damp, heavy, sad.
We sat in disbelief, surprise, shock.
I am still processing it.
Why would I then say something like “The beauty of death”?
Because I believe that we, in the west, do not see it that way. We don’t see beauty in death.
Other cultures do, especially in the east, e.g. buddhists.
I am not a buddhist, nor a monk. Just a baptized catholic woman, grown up in the west.
So, what do I even know about death?
“Knowing” about death is impossible, unless I have died.
And as I am writing this newsletter here, I am obviously alive.
I have also not had a near-death experience, I have only read & heard about them from others.
They are freaking fascinating. Science seems to catch up on them as well. And what they mean.
However, I have lived 37 years on this earth & experienced death on several occasions.
These experiences & my uncle’s passing made me think about death & how we handle it in our Western society: terribly.
That is all I can say: we handle death, our last passage of our physical earth-life, transitioning our soul to the next adventure, unbelievably terrible.
We don’t honor the process of death.
We don’t honor the dying person.
We don’t honor the mourning family, loosing a loved one.
I wish it would be different.
I wish we would be prepared & prepare ourselves for death properly when we are alive.
I wish we would embrace the fact that we have a soul that continues its travels after death.
I wish we would offer & receive help and support when we face death ourselves.
I wish we would offer family members help & support when they let go of a loved one.
There is no point to blame anyone that all this is happening, and why its not different.
The only thing I can do is, to share how I feel and think about death.
Not from an academic point of view, not from having died or experienced near-death, but from my own perception, from my heart and soul.
I feel that my thoughts & feelings around death are different to what I see we have in the western world and I think that they serve me well. So I wanted to share them with you. Because they have implications on the life I am currntly living.
I do feel weird writing about them, because they are unconventional and “not normal”.
But I cannot believe that I am the only one who has such thoughts around death, so if just one person here resonates with them and it makes them realize that they are not un-normal, I am happy.
1. I do not fear death, never have
I don’t know why that is, but I do not fear to die. I don’t see the point of fearing something that will happen either way. What would be the reason for for that?
Why do you fear death?
Because you will not be able to live your life? You are supposeed to live it NOW!
Because you will miss out on traveling? Well, you could travel NOW!
Because you will not find love? You can try to search for love NOW!
Because you will not be able to start your side hustle? You can start it NOW!
Because you wont be able to start a family? You can start it NOW!
The point is: the longer you wait, the closer you are to your death.
This is not to scare you, but it is a simple fact. Plus: we dont consciously know when we die, it’s a kinder surprise egg!
Main point to take away:
Live your life NOW!
Do all you want to do.
Be who you want to be. Then you dont need to fear dying and missing out.
2. I feel sadness when death occurs
Yes, I feel sad & devastated when death occurs. Of course I do, I am a human being with emotions. Especially when someone close to me dies, the sadnees is larger.
Or when a young person dies, who had their whole life in front, I am extra sad.
However, I am and will not feel sad when I die, because I will not be the one missing me. It will be my loved ones that will live without me & therefore be sad.
Knowing this, makes me sad again, cos of course I don’t want to make others sad.
What I do here is, to make the feeling of sadness be normal. It is okay to feel sad bcause its a sign of love and care.
I can also ensure & show my loved ones that I love them, that I love living my life to the fullest and even share that I do not fear to die!
They of course can be sad when I die, but I want them to know their whole life, that I lived the best life that I can live! That they can come with their favorite colored dress to my funeral & we will have one last, memorable festivity on earth together!
What I would always suggest is: to embrace every feeling, live it, feel it & share it! Make your loved ones see that you love your life! That you love them! So they will see, that you are fulfilled & are not missing anything. When you die, they will remember that!
3. I feel relief when death occurs
Let’s just face it: we all have issues, face challenges, juggle problems, struggle with our health, be it physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually.
Yes, some more than others, but all of us have our packages to carry. We can of course decide on how to carry them, or if we want to carry certain problems at all.
That will make our lives more or less enjoyable.
But what is clear to me is, that when we die: all struggles are gone! Done! Finito!
This makes me feel relief for the person who dies. Especially when I know they struggled deeply with certain issues their whole life. That they did not manage to deal with them. That they were plagued and full of pain.
I know, that they are relieved of all that when they die.
When you realize that we all have our struggles, it causes more empathy for others, already while you live your life. You become less judgemental, more caring and kind.
And that is just a win-win-win for everyone, including yourself!
4. I feel excited about the next journey for the person who passed
This is maybe something that is more tricky to understand, especially when you do not belive in reincarnation and past & future lifes.
But I do believe in them. Even without being a buddhist. And I see more evidence coming up around this concept, so it will sooner or later be fully accepted, yes, also in the west & the scincee world ;).
I have a soul, you have a soul. We are all souls living on earth to learn certain lessons.
I have a feeling I have lived before. As what? I dont know. But these believes around death: I always had them, since I was little. So how can that be?
Maybe they com from past-life knowledge that I have integrated into my soul. Learned from my past experiences & carried into this lifetime. This totally makes sense to me.
And I don’t care if anyone calls me crazy or a loon. I know I am not, cos I am not the only one believing that & having this feeling. Neither are these thoughts around death the only feature I carry on from past lives.
I think, it makes no sense to just dissapear into nothingness after death. Because we all have souls, those souls go somewhere, keep on living there, or maybe resting & then choosing the next adventure!
All this makes me so happy for anyone who dies, cos I believe I know, that they will keep on adventuring someehwere else! Maybe as someone else! And I love this idea!
Let’s say, all this is bullshit, you don’t believe that souls exist & neither do past & future lives exist: how does that make you feel? Honestly.
Are you indifferent towards life then? That would be sad.
Do you feel pressure & stressed to accomplish something? Why would you stress yourself? For who & for which purpose?
If someone dies then: does it even matter? Why to feel sad for them?
The point I am trying to make is: it doesn’t matter if these believes are factually right or wrong, what matters is, what they cause in us!
In me they cause that I am excited for the soul that died to continue to their next journey. I will not be sad & devastated for too long for them, cos I know they feel amazing where they are!
And just because of that, its worthy it to consider what we believe, why and what effects it has!
5. I believe that all our souls have a plan & know when & how to leave.
My soul choose to be here. It chose my family, my physical appearance, my gifts & talents, the troubled aspects of myself & the challenges I am supposed to face.
My soul also chose all that together with fellow souls, aka my family, friends, partners, animals, colleagues etc.
We made a plan. And gave me free will to execute on it or not & then send me off to earth.
This plan also included when and how my soul will leave again. With several options depending on my growth and change that I am willing to make in my life.
Because I believe that, I believe also every other person’s soul made a plan too.
What this means is, that I believe when we die of age, disease, simply a natural death, it has been one of the potential planned outcomes of each soul.
This always takes into consideration our physical, mental and emotional health as well. Cos if we decide to drink & smoke & eat unhealthy & not move our whole life, our physical body will degrade faster & wont be able to hold our soul any longer on this plane. We will die earlier.
If you believe that, it will make it easier to understand why we die at some point. It makes sense to leave when the time comes.
This also makes it easier to process death, plus knowing that the soul of the dead person is feeling bliss & happyness, without any physcial, mental or emotional constraints!
6. I believe that it is possible to die at peace.
Because of all I described till now, I deeply believe that we can die at peace.
I will certainly die peacefully without regrets. I know that, because I am doing my best to live my life as fully as I can, also because of all these believes that I have!
I want to care and to love deeply, I want to live my gifts & help others, I want to uplift my loved ones & be of value to new people & strangers. I want to feel fulfilled & full of energy.
So I do my best to be healthy: physically, mentally, emotionally & spiritually.
I will go all in, into everything that means something to me and for everyone that is important to me and I will do my best to keep healthy boundaries & avoid all the people pleasing and giving-up-myself, which I have learned in my life.
I will speak my truth, I will say “I love you”, I will be open & honest, I will be vulnerable & I will not feel ashamed if anything of all that is not reciprocated. Cos I will at least not have crippled myself because of fear or shame.
That means, that when I am for about to die, I will die at peace, knowing that I did all I could and I will be happy to enter the next stage of my soul journey.
Knowing that, and believing that, I also think that some people die happy, without any regrets and also their loved ones know they lived a fulfilling life.
For you that means, once again: live your life now, do what you want to do, even if you are afraid, or inhibited, or insecure! You will never regret having tried, but will surely feel regrets about missed opportunities!
7. I am excited for when I die, to see what comes next.
I am not sure if this point needs much more words to say: because I know my soul will continue living, I can’t freaking wait for the moment I die! Cos I will be able to see what it is that comes next for me.
This of course edoes not mean I want to die now! There is so much more to experience, but when I am 101 or 111 years old, I will have exprienced all I wanted :)
Well, maybe one more thing could be valuable to share:
I have had several psychedelic experiences. One of which brought me to what I believe is the place I will end up, when I die. We all will end up there when we die!
It is impossible to describe in words what I saw, felt and experienced, but it was unbelievable bliss, peace and freedom. And so much more.
And I know is, that my uncle is there now too. We all will get there! And this place is better than we could ever imagine!
So what I can say is: there is no reason to fear death for anyone!
8. All that makes me live my life to the fullest and not fear death!!!
Yeah, that’s it basically!
All these accumulated points and thoughts & perceptions, believes and wishes make me not fear death and also see the beauty in it, especially for the one passing away.
This is a tough and tricky topic, but I would still love to know your thoughts and experiences about it.
I believe speaking about this inevitable occurrence of dying one day is super important.
Because if we do not face and process this fact, we might lose the opportunity to live our lifes to the fullest potential we have!
Love,
Daria