Fear of death: we practice how to die every day.

The fear of death dictates our lives. When we free ourselves from it, we will be free and happy.

Everything is a cycle. Everything evolves, dissolves, and transforms. We know the physical laws of creation and destruction very well, but we don’t like to implement this knowledge to our own lives, as it shows us our own momentariness. We are born, live and then we die. When we look at the cycle of life we have to accept our own perishability and this frightens us. Death is the biggest fear we all have to face one day, better sooner than later. All fears we have are originated in the fear of death.

I give you an example of the fear I see a lot in young women turning 30. This age seems to be a magical number somehow, we suddenly feel the need to settle down, find a steady job, know who we are and where we go, and eventually to have a child. We pressure ourselves to achieve something, culture has pushed us towards. This thinking is getting old and has nothing to do with the truth. This fear creeps up because we know that we are getting older and someday we won’t be able to conceive a child anymore. The fear behind this sudden pressure and consequently suffering is the fear of our own time limitation. We are afraid to die and to leave this plane without having left anything of meaning behind. And, what has a bigger meaning than a new human being? Having a child makes us somehow immortal, we can live on in the next generation.

This thinking and avoiding the truth create immense suffering. We act, guided by culture, not according to our true self and our path. First we have to realize that everything is a cycle and the material world has a simple law: everything that is created, will someday perish. But only one day can teach you everything you need to know: you are living this truth every day and you somehow practice the cycle of life every day.

How one day can teach you everything you need to know about life

Seeing and understanding the parallels between one day and one life, between the different states of consciousness and the different stages of life can free us from the fear of death. Let’s see how:

We wake up and we are born. We feel fresh, full of energy and lust for life, depending on how we ended the previous day, our previous life. During our day we get more and more stressed, annoyed, and unhappy, if we don’t take care of ourselves and the same happens to our life. When the day comes to an end we start feeling tired and just want to relax just the same happens when we reach the end of our lives. Then we fall asleep, we die. This can happen either fast and easily, we are looking forward to resting or with great difficulties and troubles, not wanting to rest, depending on how we spent our day, our lives. If we can’t fall asleep easily and have a shallow sleep, we wake up without energy. Could the same happen to our death and the next life? Buddhists say that the way we die marks the beginning of our next life. What happens while we sleep though? We dream and process our day. Could this give a clue about what happens after death? Do we also process our life in the afterlife? Anything is possible in our dreams, and we are experiencing the dream world purely with our minds. How amazing would it be, if the same would work in the afterlife? We could experience everything and direct our life with the power of our imagination.

So you see, it is very important how we spent just one day, our life. The quality of our day, our life, marks our ability to fall asleep, to die. Also, it forms the quality of our sleep, the time in the afterlife, and consequently how we wake up, how we are born. Think about it! What makes a day a qualitatively great day for you? Apply this rule to your life and then live your life according to your findings. This will improve the entire quality of your life, the way you die, the way you spend your afterlife, and the way how you are born again.

You die and are reborn every day

We do practice how to die every day. Scientists found out that the process of falling asleep resembles the process of death. Falling asleep is basically the ability of letting go. Let go of the past, let go of your thoughts, let go of control, and let go of energy. Death seems to be way less scary now, right? Try to see the cycle in everything you do.

Focus on the small things, how they work, and what they can teach us. Even our breath can teach us so much! You inhale energy with your breath and you exhale waste. The quality of the air and your breath has an immense influence on your state of mind. So the smallest things have a huge influence on us. Breath is the only body action we can do both actively and passively. The breath is the key to our subconscious mind and when we start to lack breath we suddenly realize how important such a small, ordinary thing like a simple breath is. Breathing actively can bring us health, clean our mind, and influence our mental state. This is why Pranayama and newer Western breathing techniques, like the Wim Hof breathing method, are so powerful.

Analyze your life and realize what you have and what you don’t even cherish actively. So many things in your life have become the norm and you don’t feel gratitude for it. Bring the important things back to your consciousness, feel gratitude and joy, and treat those things with the respect and attention they deserve.