I wonder if I think about death more than other people. I have an anxiety disorder, and I would suspect that all anxieties, if pursued to their origin, would eventually lead to an ultimate anxiousness about death, so yes, I suspect, with my disorder, I think about death more than other people.
Part of it is because I am a writer, and every story, eventually, must end — my own not least of all. Part of it is because I’ve now entered my forties, and what might once have gone away on its own is now more apt to linger. Part of it is because I have a family of my own now, and I worry about them in my absence. Part of it is because I spend much of my days and nights examining my relationship to the concept of God, and that examination naturally includes a lot of blindness when it comes to one’s death. Part of it is because I feel like at any moment I could receive news of my students’ deaths, self-inflicted, accidental, or victimized, two of which have occured during my current tenure as a teacher. Part of it is because I am the son of two 70+-year-old parents, and there’s no telling what might happen.
So yes, I think about death…perhaps a lot…but do I think about it more than the next person? Isn’t the next person’s life just as touched by death as my own?
Here’s the thing though: when I think about death, I’m not “worried” about it (not on a conscious level, anyway). It’ll be what it’ll be, after all, and nothing I say or do will change that.
Christianity would beg to differ, arguing that my faith and my works here on Earth will determine my placement in the Kingdom of Heaven. Though “the Kingdom of Heaven” can be interpreted to mean the current world — the *herenow* — it also means a world that exists *beyond* death and a judgement rendered as to whether those who live in the *herenow* will be able to immigrate into the land of *hereafter* — with specific criteria determining whether an applicant has merit, and if not, then to hell with ’em.
Like some interpretations of the Kingdom of Heaven, I also value the *herenow*, but I add to that, the *herethen*. In my attempt to live as a good Taoist, I seek to find the flow of the herenow, to recognize the difference between the various channels of possibility, and “work when it is time.” But I also value the herethen, the possibility that humanity will continue to exist long after I am gone.
The Christian concept of the Kingdom of Heaven cannot be squared with my values because, in the end, Christianity does not value the continued evolution of human existence. Its ultimate goal is to drive/draw the spirit *away* from the abundance of the Earth. It does not seek to recycle the spirit back into the ultimate good of *life*.
I, however, do seek life, and because of that, I do not worry (consciously) about death. I see it, ultimately, as a good thing (not dying, per se, but death) because I see it as nothing more or less than a transfer of energy, once concentrated, now dissipate, never to reform in the same concentration again. Just as I don’t worry about the loss of energy taking place in my brain right now — it leaps from synapse to synapse, splashing energy and information like a frog leaping from one lily pad to the next — I don’t worry about death.
There is a difference between worrying about it and thinking about it. I think about it, but I think about it in terms of the *herenow* and *herethen*. Is death herenow? No? Okay. Then what can I do to make the world better in the herethen? Because let’s do that.
Some day I will greet death. But until then, I want to keep working on the world I’ll leave behind.
