Do you guys ever think about dying?

A friend of mine recently told me about a dream: she was swimming in the ocean when a tsunami began barreling toward her. It became clear there was no escape. Instead of the expected panic, she felt a sort of calm resignation.  She was terrified, to be sure, but not panicked. She felt fully in the present as the wave drew nearer, bearing witness to her last moments alive with radical acceptance.  She braced herself as her breath moved noticeably in and out of her lungs and she thought to herself, “this could be my last breath.” When she awoke, she was flooded with the preciousness and sacredness of life; grateful to be alive, but also awed to have received the gift of practicing meeting death with (relative) grace. “Death can come at any moment,” she said to me with gravity and wonder in her voice. For my part, I was astonished. This one dream had given my friend what I’d spent years in Buddhist communities learning, down to the very mantra “this could be my last breath” (the Buddha’s precise instructions to his followers) and the refrain “death can come at any moment” (an oft-repeated point of contemplation). If I loved her any less, I might be jealous. But as it were, I was deep in my training to become a death doula and felt ecstatic that my friend was being initiated in this way. She told me her therapist was wary of entertaining her musings on death and expressed appreciation that I could handle the array of thoughts and feelings evoked by her dream. This piece of information unsettled me a bit. If the therapist’s intention is to support one in living a fuller or healthier or more vibrant life, why close off to one of the most fundamental questions we have—that of our own mortality and all the fears, longings and curiosities that accompany it?

We are so culturally inept at navigating the nuance of the question of death that we avoid it all together. The generally accepted opinion seems to be that it’s morbid, depressing, and cause for concern to think about death. The recently released Barbie movie illustrates this perfectly. In the midst of a carefree, upbeat party scene, Barbie asks “Do you guys ever think about dying?” The music stops, morale plummets, and her fellow doll-people glare in disgust and distrust. She makes a quick and successful pivot (“I’m just dying to dance!”) and the party continues, letting the question dissipate into the night. Later in the movie it becomes clear that Barbie’s thoughts of death are, in fact, suicidal ideation, leaving no room for a more wholesome curiosity and driving home the point that in Barbie culture (aka peak western mainstream success) thoughts of death can only be a bad thing. 

This cultural prohibition on death contemplation does a disservice to us on many levels. We are conditioned into excessive focus on the future, robbing us of our capacity to enjoy our lives in the present; we are roped into the myth of rugged individualism, not having to look at the undeniable and unavoidable interdependence we’re all woven into; we are kept alienated from our deeper spiritual values, becoming a cog in the wheel of materialism. Contemplating death allows us to mitigate these cultural influences and live a more present, connected and liberated life. Before continuing, it seems worthwhile to mention that I am writing this from the lived experience of a white American born and bred in a capitalist mindset (aka Barbie culture.) I am fortunate to have had a somewhat unhappy childhood that prompted me to seek alternatives to my native cultural narrative, and thus don’t necessarily identify with that paradigm, but when I use “we” and “us” it is usually speaking to this influence. From my observations, this influence is pervasive and I suspect many will relate, but I am open and curious about other perspectives as well.

If there is one clear and rapid result of death contemplation, it’s presence. Though the experience differs for everyone, to be sure, taking a few moments of your life to think about the end of it will almost invariably help you connect with the moment in some way. Though that present moment may hold myriad feelings, not all of them pleasant, over time this quality of presence becomes more habitual and the unpleasantness more tolerable. When we relate to the present as the only thing we can be sure of, we become less ingrained in the culturally pervasive “if only” mindset, as in “oh if only I could buy a house or I was just a little bit more attractive or I had a better relationship with my parents/kids, then I might be happy!” Sound familiar? We are flooded with marketing campaigns aimed at making us feel inferior (not to mention increasing wealth inequality, cultural divisiveness and ongoing global trauma), so it’s nothing to beat ourselves up about, but it’s useful to become aware of. When we dwell in the “if only” mindset, we can disassociate from our lived experience of the present and become limited in our capacity for both joy and grief. The thinking is either “I can’t really be truly happy until everything is perfect” (spoiler alert: it never happens) or “I can’t feel these difficult feelings right now, I’m too busy! I have too much to do!!” We locate the solution to our problems outside of ourselves, becoming victims of our circumstances. Of course, there are times when things need to change; I don’t mean to undercut the importance of working toward a more just, equitable future that is safe for everyone. But in general, we are taught to keep our sights on the proverbial ladder and never stop climbing. I do understand the appeal of the ladder. It is satisfying to engage with the world and see our efforts bear fruit.  But so often, we create an excess of fruit in our lives, ignoring the small misshapen, imperfect harvest in our quest for perfection (what we are brainwashed is “success”). We are trained to be hungry ghosts, barely enjoying what we have before fixating once again on what’s next. But there is a unique and beautiful satisfaction in accepting the imperfections of the moment and being with life as it is in whatever messy, painful, gleeful feeling-tone we find ourselves inside of.

To return to the ladder analogy, the way we relate to death in “western” culture is not the careful and intentional descent one would likely opt for with a real-life ladder (lest we hurt our fragile bodies on the way down!) It’s more of a plummet; we leap headlong or stumble awkwardly from whatever wrung we’ve found ourselves on. This creates a very unfortunate relationship with death. Instead of honoring the climb by acknowledging the inevitability of the descent, appreciating each bit of progress and descending with a sense of completion, the approach is to set one's sights ever higher, focusing on an imaginary finish line that’s always just a few steps ahead and moves at the same pace we do; it’s a great strategy for feelings of inadequacy and disappointment. By the time the descent begins, we’ve often missed the opportunity to do so without considerable reliance on others and the difficulty of abandoning the journey to the elusive finish line is compounded by the awkwardness of our newly dependent state (another Barbie culture taboo). “Independence” is our cultural badge of successful personhood: teenagers vie for it, women proclaim it proudly and men, well, they’re straight up failures without it. (It goes without saying that people in the more colorful gender spectrum have no place in the mainstream and are often more naturally drawn toward interdependence.)  But upon even the most cursory examination of this cultural standard of independence, it begins crumbling. We are utterly and inextricably bound up with the masses of other humans on this planet. To acknowledge this, to celebrate and work synergistically with it, will get us a lot further than ignoring it. But what does this have to do with death aside from the fact that we become physically dependent in our old age?

Often in contemplating death, we realize how meaningful our relationships are to us. Not just in terms of “who will clean out my place when I die?” or “who will cry at my funeral?” but “who do I want to cherish before our time is up?” And “who would I like to make amends with before I lose the opportunity?”  These inquiries require us to open up to a certain kind of vulnerability that we are generally unaccustomed to, that we are told is weak and embarrassing. Though the cultural script around vulnerability seems to be changing (thanks, Brené) it’s still a neglected muscle for most of us. Coming to terms with the reality that death could come at any moment and we never truly know when it will happen helps boost our courage in risking a little embarrassment for the sake of effusively adoring our loved ones or owning up to admitting our regrets. In a way, the puppet strings of the ego become a bit less taught and we are compelled more by the desire to love than the desire to save face.

Getting real about death not only helps us connect with the perfectly imperfect reality of our lives and strengthen our relationships, it opens a door to a deepening of our personal spirituality or values-based living. Dedicated death contemplation can bring up questions about what happens afterwards. We don’t need to have answers—I certainly don’t—but even considering the question helps us attune to the preciousness of the life in front of us, sparking an earnestness to direct our energy and attention towards more loving, generous ways of being in the world. It invites a more process-oriented and humanely paced approach to life. Even if we believe that death is like a light switch where everything is enveloped in a consuming and unconscious darkness, that there is nothing afterwards, it attunes us to our existential terrors and angst, helping us get clear about what is important to us in the here and now. If we consider the fact that everything we work toward will end, it helps put things into relief: what actually matters to us and what’s just fluff. Each person has their own unique way of embodying pleasure and meaning, but death contemplation can help us get in touch with our own special things that make existence radiate life rather than following a cultural script of what we need to do in order to gain praise and validation from the outside. We become more intuitively guided by our own internal compass, “spiritual” or otherwise; we are more deeply attuned with our own values. When we are grounded in the fact that each hug goodbye, each beautiful view is a snapshot in time that will never happen in quite the same way again, the line between the sacred and the mundane becomes imperceptible.

Every beginning contains an ending within it. We begin dying the moment we are born. Or even before that. It sounds macabre, I know, but I think that’s because we’ve been fed so many images and stereotypes of death as gruesome and repugnant. But what if we saw it differently? Without having to agree on a monolithic understanding of what happens after death, I would hope we could agree on the inevitability and, further, naturalness of death. It seems obvious and yet there is a profound resistance to it. Yes, death can be scary and even more so, sad. For many, it is terrifying and devastating. There is no getting around this, but that doesn’t mean we can’t strengthen our capacity to be with terror and devastation. They say grief is a reflection of love, so what if we allowed the magnitude of our grief (and consequently, our love) to find expression in any given moment. What if with each subtle transition in our lives, we acknowledge the sadness of loss and the fear of uncertainty without trying to change it? What if we noticed the way we face our small fears in daily life: getting ready for a first date or initiating a difficult conversation with a family member, for example. What would it feel like to tell ourselves “I’m heartbroken” and to have that be okay? Everyone will experience life differently, there is no one right way, but the sooner we start feeling into what comes up for us when we contemplate the end of it, the more seasoned our hearts will be for the journey to come.