Dying

I started dying when I was born. Each moment of growth was accompanied by a little death.  With respect to the French saying that orgasm is a “little death,” my experience, has been that death has been with me no matter what I have done. I didn’t know it at the time, my death-realization only came to mind a few years ago. It turns out that when I looked hard at my life, I saw that each turn toward greater being was also a letting go, a death-like release. I have grown because I died.

By now, the astute reader, will recognize that I am not referring to death in the usual way. In my reality, death is not the end of the story, or the light at the end of the tunnel. It isn’t juxtaposed with Life. Instead, it is a part of Life, a regular, albeit a poorly regarded part, of each green unfolding. It is the dark light that shines dimly on the green fuse. Death is the great impermanator, the antimatter wholeness, that makes room for further evolution. 

My perception, that death has been with me from my beginnings, that it is part of my life, has changed the way I hold the decline I am experiencing. Life has taken on another hue, as loss (true little death) has reshaped my life, and prepared me for another stage. Having integrated death into living, I find myself less afraid, and a lot more peaceful and intrigued.  Now, I am just awed by how death and birth are related.

About 6 years ago, I got exposed to a Hafiz poem, that has stimulated and beguiled me. The poem, called “Deepening the Wonder” starts with the line “Death is a favor to us.” I’ve found myself thinking about how it could be a favor ever since. Over time, I arrived at the idea that death helps me clarify what really matters. It is like some kind of smelling salt, it brings me back to consciousness, where I am more prone to notice the life I am living. My life gets a little more vivid.  It seems like the more I experience death, the more I experience Life. What a strange, and interesting, paradox!

Death is an aid to Life, some kind of essential ingredient, that vivifies the dance of Creation. I would have never guessed. My culture is so busy, producing — death only represents one form of productive interruption, an inconvenience to be tolerated. Another machine stopped working. Instead, with my realization, Life and Death, take on a charge of meaning, that dignifies the process of being here. 

That is an amazing attribute for such a poorly-reputed quality of Nature!

Now, I live with a strange regard for the role death plays in making impermanence so electric. Everything is passing so quickly. I barely notice, even though I know I am one of those things. But, thankfully, death sometimes gets poignant enough, so that I get a dose of the Mystery operating within all of this. Death is a favor. I exist for only a moment on this Earth, and then something momentous takes place, altering again the trajectory I’m on. It is both: an old, and a new story.