Death as a Teacher

[Stigweard]

Every spiritual dialogue seems to inevitably address how to handle the 'ego'. So, in the sense that we are 'putting the ego in its rightful place,' here is another frame of reference from the Toltec ... namely embracing Death as a Teacher.

 

I call Death the 'great leveller' because in the view of Death we are all equal. Death does not discriminate. Death does not prefer rich people over poor, or white over black, or hindu over daoist etc.

 

From the view of Death we are no more or less important than any other being or thing in the entire Universe. Even planets, stars, solar systems, and galaxies are faced with their inevitable death. Just so are maggots, bacteria, fungi, and intestinal worms.

 

Contemplating Death quite rightly dispells the illusion that you have a differentiation of importance with the other elements of reality. Life is intrinsically interdependent, each part adding it's own dynamic to the whole.

 

Death also 'gives us an edge' because we never know exactly when we are going to die. One of the biggest illusions we suffer from is the illusion that we have time to waste. We somehow believe that we are 'immortal', that what we don't do today can be done tommorrow.

 

Sitting here reading these words could be your last moment alive. Your last moment, your last opportunity, to experience and express your 'totality of self'.

 

For example I literally just read on the news that a woman was killed sunbaking on a the deck of a boat cruising at 40km per hour when an Eagle Stingray leapt from the water and stung her in the head with it's barbed tail.

 

Any moment, every moment, could be our last.

 

In the Warrior tradition the moment of Death is the difinative moment of life and, because we can never know exactly when we are going to die, a Warrior will live every moment as if it is their last ... grasping every moment and living it to the fullest acting to the very best of their knowledge and power.

 

Embracing the reality that 'Death is stalking us' every moment of every day 'quickens' us. Instead of being a scattered cloud of past attachments and future longings all our awareness is focused like a laser beam into this moment right here, right now.

 

If this was it for you, your last breath, your last experience, how would you want to be living it?

[thelerner]

Lets see my last breath, I'd think, damnit I'm wasting my time on the computer when I could be watching a movie downstairs with the kids watching Nancy Drew, then I'd reach for the mouse as the world grew black.

 

How we die is important, our state of mnd at death may well be crucial (or not). But living each moment as though it were your last seems to be an impossibility. I could see it burning you out if you tried.

 

I like the vispasana tradition of starting meditation by giving up everything considered You, body, past, future, thoughts, emotions etc. I am not my body I am that which in habits it, I am not my past, it old memories and patterns..

 

 

Michael

[doc benway]

If this was it for you, your last breath, your last experience, how would you want to be living it?

This is one of the most profound attitudes that I derived from reading Castaneda's books 30 years ago. That was my first exposure to this mindset which has served me well.

 

Just now it occurs to me to ask in response - if this was your very first breath, your first experience, how would you go about living it?

 

Is this approach useful in some way as well?

[Stigweard]

This is one of the most profound attitudes that I derived from reading Castaneda's books 30 years ago. That was my first exposure to this mindset which has served me well.

 

Just now it occurs to me to ask in response - if this was your very first breath, your first experience, how would you go about living it?

 

Is this approach useful in some way as well?

 

I like it Thankyou Steve.

 

To be ever new

Glimpsing the world for the first

Taking it all in

 

I was wondering how this post would resonate with you folk in the northern hemisphere. In the southern regions it is of course the Autumn equinox, Mabon, the gateway to death. So my post arose from my attunement to this energy.

 

What you have done Steve is beautifully provided the Yang to the Yin, the Spring to the Autumn. Because for me, if this moment was my last, I indeed would want to be living it with freshness, aliveness, naivety and vitality; living it without the dross of my past history and my fixated view of the world; living it for what it is in it's fullness. It would be lived with an exploring, inquisitive mind finding joy in every nuance and wonder of this incredible world.

 

Thanks again Steve and Merry Ostara to you all in the North!

[minkus]

If this was it for you, your last breath, your last experience, how would you want to be living it?

 

Yust a big smile

[Smile]

[Cameron]

Adyashanti said when you meditate think of it as entering a tomb and preparing for death.

 

I liked that alot. When I sit Adya style now I think of that and it adds another dimension to sitting.

[Stigweard]

Adyashanti said when you meditate think of it as entering a tomb and preparing for death.

 

I liked that alot. When I sit Adya style now I think of that and it adds another dimension to sitting.

 

There is also a meditation, I believe from the Zen tradition, where you envision yourself growing old, dying, and then you slowly watch as your body decays and returns to dust.

[exorcist_1699]

Every moment of our life is composed of living and death ; in Hegelian terms, it is the dialectics of life ; in taoist terms, every moment consists of yin and yang where yin stands for death, and yang stands for life.

 

Awakening , a status of extreme yang , of course, stands for life .

 

Any moment of awakening you get a plus towards eternity ; any moment of non-awakening you get a step towards death. That is , change of our mind implies the close and open of the Magic Gateway.

 

 

A taoist saying tells:

 

" What is esoteric and critical is just few words ; what is general and superficial can be found in thousands of books. "

Edited March 29, 2008 by exorcist_1699