Beyond

[Renatus]

Death, such a simple concept, yet possibly the source of all human action, for all action in life can be traced to the desire to conquer it. Yet Humanity, while so dedicated, so oriented towards such an impossible feat cannot help but plan ahead for their certain demise, and try to give a face to our uncertain fate. Some like myself reason that we cannot possibly have strayed soo far from the behavior of our fellow living beings without the help of some outside force, and that our sentience, our comprehension, our very being cannot end with mere death. Others reason against that, giving in, somehow finding the will to accept certain undeniable doom. Either way humanity has found a way to cope with, and ignore the one thing everyone can be certain of, the eventual swift motion of the hand of death upon us, and the uncertain fate beyond.

It is on this mental delema that I find myself, as I stand here with the field of life before me, no safety rail, nowhere to sit down, merely walking blindly forward unknowing of if I walk into the cold arms of Death, or the arms of someone to say goodbye to. But I know one thing for certain, I am afraid, I am afraid of the base fear that drives us on, of Death, not of how I will meet him, but simply of the meeting and where he will take me, Afraid of the most incomprehendable thought, of being nothing.

I cannot seem to shake the disease that is this line of thought, this most frightful of thoughts, how do you ignore what someday will be most certinly your fate? It feels like the classic "butterflies in the stomach", and that is somthing I could deal with, if only I didn't know that this feeling, this fear was not unreasonable.

To put it simply, how do you guys deal with the idea of possibly losing everything, as Death drags you away into possibly... nothing? How do you forget/deal with, this everlasting, inborn fear? I was indirectly lead to this current seemingly unshakable line of thought yesterday after watching a movie.

[Godslayer Jillian]

No offense, but it sounds like you were just trying to sound philosophical.

The way to not care about death is accepting it; there's no science to it. You didn't care you weren't alive the fifteen billion years before now - why would you care about not being alive later?

[electrosexual]

I don't give a shit to be honest. I've always looked at it rather coldly in comparison to other beliefs. It is my view that when you die, all the neurons and cells in your brain simply shut down, resulting in braindeath. I would even go so far as to likening it to a computer that you shut down. After that, I believe there is nothing, as "life" itself is nothing more that a vast array molecules and their complex arrangements. I fully believe that there is nothing more, no soul, no afterlife, nothing beyond our comprehension.

People have always been afraid of "the end", and I believe that beliefs of an afterlife, reincarnation etc. are no more than efforts to comfort people.

[Renatus]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

No offense, but it sounds like you were just trying to sound philosophical.

The way to not care about death is accepting it; there's no science to it. You didn't care you weren't alive the fifteen billion years before now - why would you care about not being alive later?

Those words are straight out of my brain no editing for clarity and are quite disorganized because of it. I sound that way when I am thinking about certain things, fear being one of them, being bored and alone being another. The lines of thought from being bored and alone are easy to stop thinking about. This however is another story, it's occupying too much time, it's rendering me inefficient, it needs to go away at least for now.

[Breathless Horror]

My opinion is as voiced by Electro. Live like you want to, you only get one chance.

[Beneath the Shadows]

I simply don't understand the fear of death. Death is part of life. It's inevitable. So why fear it?

Maybe there's a heaven and hell. Maybe we get reincarnated. Maybe we simply end. No matter what happens after death, no matter what we believe happens, we all die. Fearing death is just a waste of life.

[Renatus]

Ok I think I need to be a bit clearer, the question of this thread is my wondering of how to forget about death, not what lies beyond, beyond is just what I titled the line of thought that I want to forget for the time being. I've gotta stop confusing people with jumbles of thought like those.

[JCC]

Think about how fucking boring it would be to live forever.

I personally am looking forward to death. It's not some great adventure, it's not even a big sleep. I'm just waiting to not be here any more. I'd like to live to a good age. But when I'm old and frail and unable to enjoy my life as I did in my youth, I won't fear death.

[Tam Li Hua]

Having lost a loved one, I have to say that it's a hard thing to accept. I try not to think too much about it or about 'what if's, and just enjoy the moment while I have it. Sure, I'll lose those I love to Death one day, but since there's really not anything I can do about that, I try not to worry about it too much.

Besides, the idea of having to say good-bye to my loved ones just hurts like hell; I'll deal with that bridge when I come to it.

As for my own Death, I try not to think of that either. I just hope God lets me into heaven, because I certainly don't want to be in hell. x_x;;;

[Godslayer Jillian]

I was about to say something like JCC's. The idea of an eternal life scares me.
Think of how great your life is, and then think of the fact that if we don't cease to exist, everything we have done is entirely insignificant even to ourselves, and that all that we have experienced will not even be a blink of an eye after billions and billions of years. And then when you consider the fact that most - if not all - religious afterlives speak about a perpetual monotone...
BLEGH!

[HumanePain]

After my sister died from leukemia decades ago I used to obsess about death as you do. I found over time that the more I tried to "forget about it" the more it would resurface, I was merely suppressing it.

The real way (for me) to forget about it was to face it, analyze it, think about it and then come to accept my conclusions about it. Then I was able to forget about it. Well almost. I do not think about it in regards to myself (I can go anytime, I don't care when), but I do worry that it may strike my loved ones prematurely. But that is all.

So face it, dive into it, study the writings of people who know they are terminally ill, study the writings of their loved ones who watched them die, read about it from the perspective of doctors and soldiers and once you know all about it, you can be at peace about it.

[Minyaliel]

Death? Hm, for several reasons (like having a six year long suicidal fit starting when I was twelve years old) does not scare me at all. I've seen worse things. It's growing old and witless that scares the living shit out of me; the possibilities of ending up senile and gibbering shut up in some institution unable to support myself and live my life independently. Since that is a possibility - we have Parkinson's running in my family - I rather view death as an easy escape route. I've told myself to fight it for ten years now, until it became a habit. I'd rather spend my life living it fully than worrying about what comes next. I'll accept whatever comes when it is my time to go. I hope I will go peacefully.

[JCC]

Yeah, if I become old and useless I'm just going to commit suicide. Death's not an issue, it's like complaining that you're scared of taking a shit, welcome to the natural order of things.