Death generally is associated with concepts such as darkness, pain, separation, sadness, and fear of the unknown. Most people are mourning because of the lost of their beloved. If we will try to go deeper on death, what is death all about? What are the attitudes of people regarding death? Why do most people hate to talk about death?
Why are we sad when one of our beloved died? Most of you might say that it is an obvious reason that you lost your beloved, but is it really a lost for the dead person or a gain?
In the following paragraph we will try to reflect on the following: First, death and life are not separate from one another. Second, death is understood not as a singular event, but as a continuous phenomenon of being. Third, death is deeply and uniquely personal, as our potentiality for being.
A person in the world has lots of possibilities – possibilities to be and to do something. With it we can say that a person is still incomplete. Why? It is because he or she did not yet obtain the ultimate possibility of a person that is death. In death, a person achieves the possibility of not-having-possibilities. When a person dies, he or she stops being in the world where he or she gets the possibilities. He or she then receives his or her final possibility, the possibility of death.
Death and life are not separated. When a person is thrown into the world, as Heidegger puts it, death is already with the person. From the start, the person is already determined to go towards the path of death. No one can avoid death. It is within us.
Death is not just a single event that happens but a continuous phenomenon of being. It is not the ordinary idea of people that death is a closing stage in a person’s life. They usually think of death as simply a part of the many stages of their lives. It is not related in anyway to the other events in a person. However, the truth is that our life is like a stage play where death is not only the concluding part but the whole conflict of the play. It is not just the passing away but it is our being towards end.
Death is deeply and uniquely personal. My death is different from yours. Your death is different from another person. You may think that the kind of death of one is the same as the kind of death of others. One example would be murder. You may simplify their death by concluding that they all basically, were killed and that makes their death the same. However, the death of a person is different from the death of others since the situation is very different. It is not only because of the time or place, but also the effect and manner of death of a person. Moreover, a person’s outlook of his or her death is different from the rest. It is deeply personal and unique.
Before the death of the grandfather of Alyssa, my friend, we visited him in the hospital. Upon our arrival, I heard from one of her relatives saying that the old man will soon die. Another relative reacted on that opinion saying it is not proper to talk about it. Looking at the old man, I asked myself if the he knows that he is dying. Before we left the hospital, I got the answer to that question. I saw the old man smiling. Is it a smile of acceptance or a smile to put aside the concept of death? Either way he knows that his death is near.
Given the universal nature of death and its tremendous impact on our world, you might think that the process of death would be of fundamental interest to each of us, every day. You might think that death would be a reality for which we would want to account from the start — to know it, to understand it, to address it head on.
But people of today are weakening — prefer to ignore death if at all possible. When they are not busy living, as if death were not going to happen, they create philosophies that make them feel better about death. They are afraid to face the reality that all will die be one rich or poor, young or old because it is the extreme possibility a being.
Death brings us to the face to face to the ultimate condition of being – that we will all die, someday. Some people face this with disgust. Some do not even face this, but run away from this like one of the relatives of my friend.
We must not hide from the reality that someday we too will die. We need to look at death as a festive occasion, in we rejoice for finally achieving the wholeness of our being; since only in death can we achieve our ultimate possibility, the possibility of not having possibilities.
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