Death is all around. It is waiting for us and sometimes comes cold and sudden. Most of our lives, we live without it being a palpable presence in our lives. That is a privilege. Then every once in a while, we come face to face with it. It shows up on our doorstep. We are forced to deal with not just this one death, but all deaths, and the deteriorating and seemingly hopeless nature of our existence.
Humans do all manner of things to avoid death and thoughts of death. Most of the time, we live under the illusion we will live good long lives and die peacefully. I’m sure you know that is not the case for some. Our lives are darkened by the shadow of death looming. Sometimes it comes on when it is “supposed to.” A person lives a good long life and dies in their bed with loved ones around. If that is the case for you, you are one of the lucky ones. But many times, death rears its ugly head when you least expect it – suddenly and unfairly: a life snuffed out before its time. Sometimes you feel responsible – you took a life or could have done something to save it. Those are tougher to deal with.
Life can be whisked away in an instant. It takes your breath away – sometimes when you least expect it. And it takes your hope away, at least for now. You must do the work of understanding death – why it is a thing, what it is saying to you from beyond and how it fits into your view of your life. Whether you want to admit it or not at any point, it is coming.
Before death comes for you in a final way, it will show its face several other times. A loved one dies. Someone else you know or hear about dies. Your fish die. Death is at your shoulder and touches you to remind you of its existence and its gravitational pull. At those points, you have opportunity to deal with death – not just your own, but the fact that everything and everyone around you is in some state of deterioration and disrepair, headed toward destruction.
We avoid death, but we are also drawn to it. We become preoccupied with it because we need to reconcile it. Do you ever wonder why people return to their trauma over and over, though it harms them? There is something in us that wants to heal those deep hurts and understand them, of course. The only way to do that is to keep bringing them up – rehearsing our responses, but also titrating them by introducing new understanding of ourselves and of life. We do the same thing with death. We are oriented toward preserving our lives, but we do our fair share of taking risks and things that slowly kill us. We are not fully unaware death is where we’re headed, and, in some ways, we hasten it. Freud called it the “death drive.”
Our minds want to reconcile things that seem opposed. How, in a world so full of beauty and ecstasy, can the utter hopelessness of a life taken too soon be part of the story? It seems unfair, and it is. Reconciling is bringing two things together – life and death, hope and hopelessness, fairness and unfairness. Existence is equal parts life and death. They temper one another, like water and volcanic magma. You must combine the two successfully and understand their very important relationship to know what you are doing here.