Death… How to deal with it.
I read a facebook post that made me think a bit about death today. Its a topic I’v ruminated on many times over the past decade or so. A facebook post of a friend’s sister who lost their teenage daughter unexpectedly made the pain of death real again for me.
The Pain
Its not rare that I get a bit frustrated with this world and wonder what the heck I’m doing here. Sixteen years ago my dad was killed. For sixteen years I’v searched for answers. For sixteen years I’v studied the scriptures, I’v studied life after death experiences, I’v studied history, New Age, the mystics, the occult. I’v consulted the oracles and communed with the spirits. “Every answer found, begs another question… The further you go, the less you know. The less I know.”
Graduation. Less than a year from departure.
So at any rate, I thought I’d give my current perspective on this old question of Hosea’s. Death… where is thy sting? Well, from the conscious perspective of my eighteen year old mind… it’s still here. I know Christ was supposed to have swallowed up the sting of death in his resurrection, but if that’s the case why does death hurt like Hell? I’v been stung by a bee, and by a wasp. I was not a cautious teen and Iv been badly hurt more times than i can count. Broken bones, knee surgery, and whats worse I’v been tortured into eating asparagus on multiple occasions and I can certainly say that the unexpected death of a loved one before their time was infinitely more painful. In the years after my dad died (just after my graduation from high school) The pain was persistent, chronic and systemic. For at least one year I could not think about my Dad without either uncontrollably bawling or having to muster all my energy to lock in the flood of emotions and seal them in. And each time they would flow, how could you describe it other than pain? Like someone was taking a dagger, stabbing it into your heart and twisting for as long as the wave lasted. Perhaps that is a bit graphically over dramatic but for those who have experience it, how else do you describe it? I
The Why
– I have a lot of ideas on what it is that makes death “painful”. I think much of it is fear. Fear of the unknown.
-I think much of it pain born from the group consciousness. Because so many deaths throughout history have been painful and even gruesome, the group consciousness has developed a repulsion for it. We are tied to the group mind which corresponds to our level of consciousness, and thus are greatly influenced by it’s learned reactions. The “group mind” or psycho-spiritual connection between humans is worthy of an article of itself.
-I think much of it IS a break in that psycho-spiritual connection. Science hasn’t come to fully understand this concept yet, but humans are mentally connected in many subtle ways. Loosing someone close can be akin to having part of our brains removed, because our brains and other aspects of our biology come to depend on our social networks in a very real biological manner. There are subtle electromagnetic transponders and receivers in the human biology. Scientist are just recently coming to find definite evidence of these biological mechanisms in animals (salmon for example). We come to rely on eachother in psychological ways that are rooted in our biology, and when part of our emotional support system is removed, it can truly be like loosing a biological member of our body. We must learn to psychologically function without them in a manner very similar to one having to learn to walk with just one leg after loosing the other.
-the rest of it is the purely obvious. It just sucks not to be able to hang out with someone you’re used to hanging with. But those who have experienced multiple death experiences understand how minimally this can account for the pain. When my grandparents died I thought, “man it sucks i’m not going to be hanging out with her or talk to her on the phone for 60-80 years”. But there was no huge emotional reaction. It was like they were going on a long wonderful trip, which sucked a bit but I was happy for them and the whole process was natural and not very painful. Compare that to when my dad died, who I also did not interact with a whole lot or consciously lean on for emotional support. It was 1000 times more painful… why? I believe only the psycho-spiritual connection can explain the difference.
The Solutions
Solution 1: However, one can overcome the pain associated with these phenomenon. We chose who we make our psychosomatic connections with. If our primary connections are with mortals, we will be pained when they leave us. This is a huge topic and difficult to explain. It requires an understanding of the subtle realms. If you have no belief in or connection to the subtle realms the only way to avoid the pain of death is to shut off your subtle senses to all human connection. “harden your heart” as a religionist would say. If you love no-one, and let no one in, perhaps you can avoid the pain when you loose them.
Solution 2: A far better way however is to learn to connect and derive your energy from the subtle realms. “live by the spirit” as scripture would say. The greater your ability at connecting with the subtle (spiritual) realms, the less death will affect these connections and the less you will suffer. There are so many ways to explain what happens to people when they die. You can envision them going to a “Spirit World” (which millions of near death experiences would show that this is how it appears from their perspective- see nderf). You can envision the personality aspect of their consciousness reabsorbing into the earth’s electro-magnetic field (this is how it would appear from our perspective has we technological instrumentation with the ability to read and follow the subtle fields). Eventually I believe the whole phenomenon will be most understandably described by multidimensionality in the universe and the holographic nature of reality.
-the bottom line is taught in nearly every religion and symbolized by the creation drama of Christianity. At the most subtle level and the most primordial time, all is and was one. At some point “God” divided or separated this oneness into many-ness. The heavens from the earth, the waters from the land, the light from the dark, male and female from androgynous man. The process of “creation” is in fact a process of division or separating from the eternal unity that is and was the “most-high god”. When one understands that the “most-high god” is a composite of all that is (see D&C 88:7–13, Acts 17:28), it maintains the understanding that we too are God’s members, one with God as a hand is one with a body (1 Corinthians 12:12, John 15:1–7, John 17:21–23 ). At some point in the dividing process mankind itself was separated from God, loosing the connection in consciousness which unifies all things. Kicked from the Garden and veiled by flesh and ego from unity man lost the ability to “see” and communicate with the rest of creation in all its dimensions. This psychic separation from each-other or “fall” in consciousness gave death its sting. And to be “redeemed” is to remember we are one and regain conscious awareness of the rest of creation. To replace mere physical connections with more subtle spiritual connections. Connections to and awareness of the rest of earth, connected awareness of the earth’s subtle realms, and awareness of the cosmos. This connected awareness is accessed in the opposite manner as mentioned above; it requires opening our “hearts” or biological receivers to others and all of creation. As we begin to psychologically dissolve the perceived differences between ourselves and others/otherness we will begin to regain unity. We must put away our ego which suggests we are different and separate (better or worse) than others. The ego which suggests the world of holographic illusion perceived by our physical senses is actually the highest “reality”.
If we “see” by the light of the moon, we see the world but dimly. If we see by the light of the sun we see only a little bit better because we are still perceiving only a small spectrum of reality through the biological mechanism which interprets visible light for us. We must use our more subtle “extra sensory” biological mechanisms to “perceive” the more subtle wavelengths of the electromagnetic field which make up true reality.
Those who go through painful experiences of death and separation are at a real advantage here. These individuals are confronted with a reality that most chose to ignore; the reality of the painful unknown. Although there are some who chose solution one, most who those who go through this experience ask why? They ask where? They persistently look for answers and in years of deep searching they are led to solution two. If you look into the backgrounds of those who truly have meaningful things to contribute to humanities view of reality, you will find loss and painful experiences. You will find trails or catalysts which motivated individuals to search and progress. And you will find individuals who in hindsight would not trade those experiences for the world.
But How?
How do we stop the pain? The first step is to stop fighting it, and just accept it. The next is to objectively analyze it and find the beauty and information embedded in it. If when the pain comes, you focus on the separation and what you have lost you will reinforce the separation and loss. Search closely through the pain and find the love embedded in it. Rip off all the aspects of selfishness and ego clouding the emotional waves and you will find at their root pure unselfish love. Likely a stronger love than you have ever experienced. Once you see the love let it flow through you, and send it back to your loved one.
If you find yourself unable to consider life after death perhaps you need to start by acknowledging the existence of the unknown. This takes putting away your pride/ego and is the hallmark of a true scientist or truth seeker. Acknowledge that everything you know is almost certainly an incomplete understanding of just a portion of a greater reality. Become a child with a sense of wonder at the immensity of things out there still to be discovered. Stop trying to see only with your eyes, hear with only your ears and understand with your intellect. Realize that it is the mind that processes these signals into a “reality”, and that same mind has access to other biological mechanisms that perceive input as “feelings” and thoughts which are more subjective, but no less “real” than the signals received by conventional senses. Realize you do not have to “see” or talk to a loved one, in order to connect and communicate with them. Find a still place and enjoy the connection without words or images, simply turn your consciousness to them and feel the interactive connection. Realize that when you feel pain associated with loss, it is almost always a reaction of ego and pride. It is ego which maintains the illusion of separation. Read as many life after death experiences as possible and you’ll see that everyone has a different reality. Understand that among the living, your perception of reality can be quite different from other’s perception of reality and this becomes more apparent after death because the planes/dimensions above this one are more fluid. As we raise, or outer reality becomes more a reflection of our inner reality. On earth a person could outwardly perceive a rich man as happy and a poor man as miserable, yet by really getting to know those individuals we could learn that the rich man is miserable and the poor man is happy. From life after death experiences it would appear that we inherit a world where our outer reality is a projection of our inner reality. The same is true on earth, but the delay time is far greater. A bad attitude WILL manifest in a perceived bad experience but in some cases in may take a while;