This site shares Life-affirming meditations
that heal misconceptions about Death.
Living beautifully and dying beautifully,
Embrace Death as Birth
into limitless Life Awareness.
But you would ask me: Why do things change?
Why does particular matter force itself to other forms?
I answer you—there is no mutation that seeks another being,
but rather another mode of being.
Understand that everything is one, but not in the same mode.
Everything we see in difference in bodies…
is nothing else than a diversity of appearances of the same substance;
a transitory, mobile, corruptible appearance
of an immobile, stable, and eternal being.
All things are in the universe,
and the universe is in all things—
we in that, that in us;
and, therefore, all things concur in a perfect unity.
You see by this, then,
that we ought not to torment our spirit,
for there is no thing by which we ought to become vexed.
Death is but a stage in this process.
Giordano Bruno
(1548-1600)
from “Death Is Not Possible in the Infinite Universe”
Jacques Choron: Death and Western Thought
….when Death unlocks the door for him,
he knows the country into which he emerges,
having trodden its ways at his own will.
And at last he grows to recognise that fact of supreme importance,
that "Life" has nothing to do with body and with this material plane;
that Life is his conscious existence, unbroken, unbreakable,
and that the brief interludes in that Life,
during which he sojourns on Earth,
are but a minute fraction of his conscious existence,
and a fraction, moreover, during which he is less alive,
because of the heavy coverings which weigh him down.
For only during these interludes (save in exceptional cases)
may he wholly lose his consciousness of continued life,
being surrounded by these coverings
which delude him and blind him
to the truth of things,
making that real which is illusion,
and that stable which is transitory.
Annie Besant
Death— And After?
By the period you call old age
the inner attention is already escaping.
The strong focus of psychic energy
needed to maintain the splendid physical image-organization
is no longer given.
The main focus of the whole self has already begun to stray,
and the energies used in necessary pattern organization for the physical plane
are already being returned,
taken from their attention to physical matters,
and becoming more attuned to the whole self
from which they were originally delegated.
Man is aware subconsciously
of a heritage for which he ever seeks,
and yet which for many reasons
he cannot grasp while in the physical state.
Jane Roberts
The Early Sessions: Book 3 of The Seth Material
Remember,
only that which you can take with you when you leave the body is important.
That means, except meditation, nothing is important.
Except awareness, nothing is important,
because only awareness cannot be taken away by death.
Everything else will be snatched away,
because everything else comes from without.
You will be taking with you
only whatsoever awareness you have attained.
Awareness is your only real wealth.
Osho
The wisest beings with whom I have made contact in this lifetime
all assure me that a soul leaves the physical plane
neither a moment too early nor a moment too late.
For most of us on Earth
who so strongly identify with our own bodies and personalities,
this is hard to accept.
If we have not listened deeply enough inside ourselves to know differently,
we consider length of life an asset,
which makes it difficult to be with the dying
without trying to keep them alive.
Ram Dass
Walking Each Other Home: Conversations on Loving and Dying
Grace, calm, a patient acceptance of what’s to come:
These are all qualities that can be cultivated,
and when they are, death is a test we will not fail.
Our fault is not that we fear death
but that we don’t respect it as a miracle.
The most profound subjects—
love, truth, compassion, birth and death—
are equal.
They belong to our destiny but also to our present life.
Deepak Chopra
Life After Death
It is quite possible to remain in connection, after death,
with people who one was close to during life,
but only through an emotional affinity which one had with them then.
An intense connection is formed as a result of such affinity.
After death one lives together with the living;
but also with those who have already died
with whom one had a connection during life.
This is how one must imagine the life after death,
which continues in this way for years.
It is a life in which the soul chiefly lives
through everything which it wills and desires and longs for
in connection with its felt and willed memories of the life that is past.
Rudolf Steiner
Life Beyond Death
Life and death are not two opposing forces;
they are only two ways of looking at the same force,
for the movement of change is as much the builder as the destroyer.
The human body lives because it is a complex of motions,
of circulation, of respiration, and digestion.
To resist change,
to try to cling to life,
is therefore like holding your breath –
if you persist you will kill yourself.
Ramesh Balsekar
Let Life Flow
To most people, death remains a hidden secret,
as eroticized as it is feared.
We are irresistibly attracted by the very anxieties we find most terrifying;
we are drawn to them by a primitive excitement
that arises from flirtation with danger.
Moths and flames,
mankind and death—
there is little difference.
Sherwin B. Nuland
How We Die: Reflections on Life's Final Chapter
To the average man
death offers one means of ridding himself of the thing called body,
but to the spiritual man
the new salvation makes it possible to ascend above it.
Not in the sense of material measurement,
but simply rising to a mental state where he sees
everything perfect and harmonious, here and now,
and recognizes that he is already in the Kingdom of Heaven.
When he has reached this state
there is no need to dispose of matter,
for the material concept has disappeared of its own self.
Walter C. Lanyon
The Joybringer
We are so much attached to our own feeling , to our individual existence.
For us , just now, we have some fear of death,
but after we resume our true original nature,
there is Nirvana.
That is why we say,
“ To attain Nirvana is to pass away. ”
“ To pass away ” is not a very adequate expression .
Perhaps “ to pass on, ” or “ to go on, ” or “ to join ” would be better.
Will you try to find some better expression for death?
When you find it,
you will have quite a new interpretation of your life.
Shunryu Suzuki
Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind
One realizes that they are and always will be,
and therefore lives in the now.
One knows that they cannot be injured or destroyed —
that they exist in accordance with Law (and that Law is Good).
One seeks no explanation, knowing that as the time comes,
they will progress through matter,
discarding sheath after sheath in its unfoldment,
attaining greater and greater degrees of knowing.
One sees Death and Life as one.
One sees Death as Birth.
One loses all its fear of Death, knowing it as it is.
One sees behind the hideous mask of Death,
the beautiful face of the radiant creature — Life.
These and other experiences come to the Soul when it awakens.
William Walker Atkinson
Nuggets of The New Thought
Life takes on a new meaning
when one reaches the borders of Spiritual Consciousness,
and takes a few steps beyond the borders.
Words cannot convey the idea —
it must be experienced to be comprehended.
One becomes conscious of having always existed — existing now —
and being intended for existence forever.
One does not reason out these things — one knows them,
just as before one had felt that they existed at any particular moment.
The “I Am” has taken on a new meaning — has apparently grown,
although one knows that they have not really grown,
but that one for the first time has arrived at a stage of consciousness
capable of recognizing themselves as they are.
One knows that they are in but the borderland of the Cosmic Knowing —
and that beyond lie regions of marvelous beauty
which in turn will be traveled.
One sees endless phases of existence
opening up to the vision.
William Walker Atkinson
Nuggets of The New Thought
In ancient Egypt,
to capture and mummify dangerous animals
like hundreds of crocodiles who served as messengers
from this world to the next
demonstrated the ancients’ reverence for death.
And did you know that a tribe in Africa
hangs the skull of the deceased over their doorway
and consults the dead regularly?
From the study of death,
my students and I learned a lot.
John Abraham
How to Get the Death You Want: A Practical and Moral Guide
Of course I do not think about death and dying all the time.
Nor does anyone.
La Rochefoucauld commented:
“One can no more look steadily at death than at the sun.”
At the same time we must not neglect one of the essential realities of life,
in ignoring death.
People tend to build up fears about topics hidden from them,
and these fears grow to be worse than the realities.
Death is a biological reality, a cultural phenomenon,
a spiritual event, an economic reality and a psychological process.
The topic is taboo in our society,
making it important to address the reality of death
seriously, realistically and helpfully.
We sorely need an objective and comprehensive kind of education
informing our understanding of death.
John Abraham
How to Get the Death You Want: A Practical and Moral Guide
I believe wholeheartedly in assisted death.
Not assisted suicide for depression.
Depression is a treatable, reversible condition.
Suicide is inappropriate, except in untreatable, unbearable suffering.
Death is not treatable or preventable.
Death can be easy or it can be utterly, devastatingly miserable.
It can be totally destructive of all dignity, privacy, and autonomy,
much less comfort. We have all seen it.
I fully respect the right of individuals to their own beliefs and end-of-life wishes.
I do not condone the imposition of personal religious beliefs
on someone who does not share the same convictions.
I believe it to be morally, ethically, humanely, and mercifully unconscionable
that a dying person must accept prolonged suffering
if that individual does not wish it.
This sometimes is justified by the myth
that physical and emotional suffering at the end of life can be controlled.
We all know that this is often not possible.
Sometimes we resort finally to medicating the individual into a semiconscious state.
And just what is the point of that?
Two months ago, I was diagnosed with advanced myelodysplastic syndrome.
My estimated survival time is 4 to 6 months,
which I suspect is optimistic.
At my age, 73, and general medical condition,
bone marrow transplant is not an option.
Chemotherapy might offer a few months of extended existence,
at the risk of spending it all sick from adverse effects.
I have opted for palliative care in hospice.
I will eventually die of anemia or infection of some sort.
And there is the rub.
What sort of death will it be?
I personally opt for as easy as possible.
John Rowe III, MD, Medford, Oregon
Journal of the American Medical Association
Also published in:
John Abraham
How to Get the Death You Want: A Practical and Moral Guide
Death is now the result of the will of the soul.
Eventually it has to be the result
of the united will of the soul and the personality,
and when that happens,
there will be no fear of death.
Ponder on this.
Alice A. Bailey
Discipleship in the New Age
The person you think is going to die is not the person you are now
Who you are now is impossible to lose –
and this will be true at all future moments at which you exist.
You fear death because you imagine your self to be a static thing
which will continue unchanged (amid an ever-changing world)
until the dreaded moment at which your brain stops working.
But it is logically impossible for you –
the feeling of being one brain in the present – to die.
And what else can you ever be
except the feeling of being one brain in the present?
Death only marks a limit to what new experiences can arise
based on the memory chain that a brain has access to.
David Darling
Zen Physics, The Science of Death, the Logic of Reincarnation
The act of dying is like falling asleep,
the effect of dying is to forget all about being one particular person,
and the sequel to dying is the gradual laying down
of new memories in a new brain,
which will define another particular person.
What is crucial is that, from the subjective point of view,
although one set of memories (and life circumstances)
is completely replaced by another,
and one brain by another,
there is no cessation of experience,
of consciousness, of being.
One story ends and,
in the wink of an eye as felt from within,
another story begins.
David Darling
Zen Physics, The Science of Death, the Logic of Reincarnation
No one who has experienced death ever mourns the death of anyone.
Neale Donald Walsch
The Complete Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue
You think that life on Earth is better than life in heaven?
I tell you this,
at the moment of your death you will realize the greatest freedom,
the greatest peace, the greatest joy,
and the greatest love you have ever known.
Shall we therefore punish Bre’r Fox
for throwing Bre’r Rabbit into the briar patch?
Neale Donald Walsch
The Complete Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue
Every man is related to the dead,
as shown by clairvoyant consciousness.
When the young—children or juveniles—pass through the gate of death,
it is seen that the connection between the living and the dead
is different from that of older people,
those dying in the twilight of their life.
There is a decisive difference
. When we lose children,
when the young are apparently taken from us,
they do not really leave us at all,
but remain with us.
This is seen by clairvoyant consciousness
by the fact that the messages we receive on awakening
are forceful and vivid when the dead concerned died as children or young people.
The connection between those remaining behind and the dead
is then such that we can only say
that a child or young person is not lost at all;
they really remain present.
Rudolf Steiner
Earthly Death and Cosmic Life
There’s no such thing as dying.
You just go on to a different stage of your life.
Dying is pleasant.
If people are worried about it,
tell them to go to a place in the river that has a deep pool.
Tell them to dive down to the bottom of the pool.
And then, at the bottom push up vigorously with their feet
and come plunging up to the surface.
Tell them it is like that.
Dolores Cannon
Between Death and Life: Conversations With A Spirit
Dying is the most important thing you do in your life.
It’s the great frontier for every one of us.
And loving is the art of living as a preparation for dying.
Allowing ourselves to dissolve into the ocean of love
is not just about leaving this body;
it is also the route to Oneness and unity
with our own inner being, the soul,
while we are still here.
If you know how to live and to love,
you know how to die.
Ram Dass
Walking Each Other Home: Conversations on Loving and Dying
You have created a society in which it is very not okay to want to die—
very not okay to be very okay with death.
Because you don’t want to die, you can’t imagine anyone wanting to die—
no matter what their circumstances or condition.
But there are many situations in which death is preferable to life—
which I know you can imagine if you think about it for even a little bit.
Yet, these truths don’t occur to you—they are not that self-evident—
when you are looking in the face someone else who is choosing to die.
And the dying person knows this.
She can feel the level of acceptance in the room regarding her decision.
Have you ever noticed how many people wait until the room is empty before they die? Some even have to tell their loved ones—
“No, really, go. Get a bite to eat.”
Or “Go, get some sleep. I’m fine. I’ll see you in the morning.”
And then, when the loyal guard leaves,
so does the soul from the body of the guarded.
Neale Donald Walsch
The Complete Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue
The best dying practice, the best way to die,
is to have already ‘made real the wisdom mind of the buddhas’ within oneself. Enlightened practitioners have already before their deaths,
reached the highest levels of Western developmental psychology,
through their spiritual practices, and their service to all life.
The body is no longer a sarcophagus,
imprisoning the consciousness within flesh,
bone and the material world; it is a tool merely.
Consciousness does not exist within the body;
it is the reverse case for the highly evolved:
body exists within consciousness.
These highly evolved ones are able to consciously dissolve the physical elements
drawn together to form the vehicle of manifestation:
they may choose not to leave behind a dead container
for others to disintegrate using burning (the best way) or burial.
Sogyal Rinpoche tells of one instance of many,
the death of Sonam Namgyal, in Tibet in 1952.
He asked that his body be wrapped and left undisturbed for a week.
In that time, the lamas, monks and family
noticed the mass in the wrappings shrinking.
When unwrapped for burial, only his hair and nails remained.
Great rainbows (and other phenomena)
mark the assumption of the Body of Light or the Rainbow body, by such saints.
Susan Elizabeth Shore
Death, Our Last Illusion: A Scientific and Spiritual Probing of the Life Beyond Death
As the Tibetan Book of the Dead teaches,
the dying should face death not only calmly and clear-mindedly
but with an intellect rightly trained and rightly directed,
mentally transcending, if need be, bodily suffering and infirmities,
as they would be able to do had they practiced efficiently
during their active lifetime the Art of Living,
and, when about to die, the Art of Dying.
But in the Occident,
where the Art of Dying is little known and rarely practiced,
there is, contrastingly, the common unwillingness to die,
which, produces unfavourable results.
As here in America,
every effort is apt to be made by a materialistically inclined medical science
to postpone, and thereby to interfere with, the death-process.
Walter Evans-Wentz
Quote from:
Susan Elizabeth Shore
Death, Our Last Illusion: A Scientific and Spiritual Probing of the Life Beyond Death
Two conditions must exist in order to classify a death as a suicide.
1. You must be aware of what you are doing—
that is, you must be making a conscious choice to die.
2. You must be making the choice to die for the purpose of escaping,
rather than completing, your life.
Neale Donald Walsch
Home With God
Is death to be understood as within, or outside of, human life?
It is said, often enough, that death is a "part of life."
But what does that phrase, almost a cliche, mean?
It has been explored much less than it should be.
That exploration inexorably leads to perhaps the most troubling problem of all—
how we are to find meaning in death,
if there is any meaning to be found.
Daniel Callahan
The Troubled Dream of Life: In Search of a Peaceful Death
Death is our eternal companion.
It is always to our left, an arm’s length behind us.
Death is the only wise adviser that a warrior has.
Whenever he feels that everything is going wrong
and he’s about to be annihilated,
he can turn to his death and ask if that is so.
His death will tell him that he is wrong,
that nothing really matters outside its touch.
His death will tell him,
I haven’t touched you yet.
Carlos Castaneda
Journey to Ixtlan
Jung tells us that from the perspective of the Self—
which he defined as our entire psyche, including the conscious, unconscious,
and ego, as well as a self-regulating center—
death is understood not as an end, but rather as a transformation.
From the broader, more holistic point of view of the Self,
death is seen as an initiation into a new life, one we cannot yet imagine.
This way of understanding death—
as a transformation rather than an end—
can also be found in the sciences.
Albert Einstein’s first law of thermodynamics asserts that
energy cannot be created or destroyed;
it can only be changed from one form to another.
Following this model, the elements that once made our body
are recomposed after our death, into other structures or organisms.
As astronomer Carl Sagan poetically noted,
we ourselves are “made of star stuff,”
which is to say that the matter that makes up our physical bodies
was “forged in the bellies of distant, long-extinguished stars.”
Joanna Ebenstein
Memento Mori: The Art of Contemplating Death to Live a Better Life
Death is just infinity closing in
Jorge Luis Borges
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