How I Conquered my Fear of Death
And Brought Peace to My Teenage Mind
In the beginning there was God, little fluffy clouds, angels and harps. That was my understanding of death as a very young child.
One two three four five six seven — All good children go to heaven; when they die their sins are forgiven — one two three…..So the rhyme says.
My mind boggled as I got a little older. How many people fit on each cloud. Will we need airplanes to get them all there? Will my cat be welcome on the cloud and where will he get his favorite kibble? So many questions but who was I to doubt the trusted authorities on death; my parents, my teachers, the clergy?
Surely they know what they are talking about?
I accepted these beliefs until I sat at age twelve in a hospital waiting room, numb with fear. A priest had come to tell my older sister and myself that he had administered the last rites to my mother who had suffered a massive heart attack.
Little fluffy clouds….
Relatives were desperately trying to contact my father who was attending a conference and by the time he arrived at ER, my mother had rallied and was out of immediate danger but still critically ill.
I spent a week of sleepless nights; angry with God for my mum’s plight, doubting the heavens, accepting the fact that I might lose her to the clouds and angels above. Was there any such thing as angels and harps and a kind God who loved me, loved my Mum? Drifting to sleep with distorted images of the sky filled with dead people.
Until she got strong enough to leave Intensive Care and after a long convalescence she was mercifully allowed to return home. Weakened heart; no surgery possible; another attack was inevitable in the future. My mother’s impending death hung over me like a sword.
Little fluffy clouds…
As my mum’s health slowly improved, my crisis of faith diminished but never really disappeared. Two years later in High School my biology and physics classes alongside religious instruction deepened the conundrum. The more I learned about creationism -v- evolution, the more I got confused about dying and the afterlife. Who could I ask? I found out quickly that this was a field too many people wanted to avoid. Nobody, not even my teachers were comfortable speaking about the idea of dying and what happens after death.
Did the original picture of the afterlife portrayed to me as a child still stand? Ever-expanding clouds and legions of angels with harps? Worse still, was it to be something akin to ‘The Last Judgement’ — a painting by Hieronymus Bosch we had been shown in art class depicting horrific torture and hellfire.
Death of an illusion
Out of the blue came an answer from Sister Aimée, our religious teacher in Form Six. A tiny French nun with an over-sized veil, she wore thick tortoiseshell glasses that almost hid her bird-like face. Our class of restless teenagers chatted and threw pencils while this little nun spoke in a hushed voice almost to herself when she suddenly declared
‘Heaven is not quite what you’ve learned about….‘It’s not a place. It’s a state’
I was riveted to my chair. I put away the math homework I was doing and shushed my neighbors so I could listen.
Sister Aimée described how our life-forces or souls leave our bodies at death and are drawn to the GOOD, a huge force of good — a form of heaven. She also explained that if our life-force (yes, she did use the term ‘Life-Force’) was inherently bad (she added that this was a particular form of monstrous evil — not pencil throwing) then this force upon leaving the body could not bear to be in the presence of goodness and would exile itself, quite deliberately — a form of hell.
Phew…
Burgeoning fluffy clouds begone…
I felt so relieved that I had something to work on now…some concept…something to follow down a rabbit hole. It was like being told there’s no Santa Claus…but instead the spirit of Father Christmas or Gandhi or Mother Theresa lives in all of us. If we care to let it show.
Marking the loss of innocence
As I got older I became obsessed looking for answers to what I perceived as the common anxieties about death. I especially sought out an image of the afterlife I could replace in my mind that would resonate with the adult me. I read volumes from such diverse sources as:
- Elizabeth Kubler Ross
- Marianne Williamson
- Deepak Chopra
- Rupert Sheldrake
- Neville Goddard
- Eckhart Tolle
All gave me comfort and hope in different ways.
The key message I got from reading this literature is that if I strove to understand a little better the mystery of death, then I would begin to understand how precious life is and not just to live life, but to feel alive. According to Elizabeth Kubler Ross’[from ‘Life Lessons’ 2002] if we embrace the idea of death and dying
‘we will be without fear at the end, without guilt, and without unfinished business’.
This was a far greater message than I expected. In exploring death, the most important lesson I learned was that I should live every day to its fullest.
How could I practice this? How could I ensure that I stopped holding life ‘with a clenched fist’?
My answer came from the teachings of Neville Goddard who in his book ‘The Art of Dying’ said that we must learn to die all throughout our lives. That is, we must learn to die in the mystical sense. Learn to die to whatever unsuitable states we find ourselves in, in order to yield to a new state. Drawing out of ourselves the things we most desire. Die to what ‘we are’ in order to live what we want most to be. And do this daily!
The passing of both my parents was the most heart-breaking experience for me and my siblings but by this time I had stopped looking at death as the ultimate loss. A calm acceptance had washed over me which enabled me to help with the preparations of fitting funeral services for my Mum and Dad that embraced their personalities, that spoke of the great impact they had on our lives, an impact that will continue as long as we ourselves live.
My Eternal Journey
And now in my middle-age I have more days behind me than I have ahead. But still my quest continues. I still seek answers. But the messages I receive now are more subtle and almost playful.
Recently I have begun to see afterlife cues in the arts and movies.
The bittersweet movie ‘Supernova’ (2020) portrays a touching nostalgic last-trip for Sam and Tusker, partners for 20 years, who travel across England reuniting with friends and family to spend as much time together as they can before Tusker succumbs to a disease and dies.
Watching shooting stars in a black sky, Tusker says to a young and curious girl relative
‘Your body is made out of bits of exploding stars…. When a star gets very old it runs out of fuel and it explodes like a firework. And when it dies, it becomes really, really bright and it shoots out all of this stuff that travels through space for years, and years, and years, and years…and eventually it’s what makes us. So we are all like the stars’.
Tusker tells the young girl to never stop asking questions, no matter what her mother says. That we will not starve for lack of wonders, but from lack of wonder.
In The Beginning
This brought me full circle back to a book I read early in my quest to find answers about death and the afterlife.
‘The Hermetica’ The Lost Wisdom of the Pharaohs is collection of Greco-Egyptian writings that have inspired some of the world’s greatest artists, scientists and philosophers including Leonardo da Vinci, Shakespeare, Milton, Newton, Shelley, Blake and Jung.
The message from The Hermetica is clear:
From mankind’s perspective, time is a destroyer. Through the process of time we age and die.
But from a cosmic perspective, time is an endlessly repeating cycle.
It suggests that most people are oblivious to the fact that from decay comes renewal. They therefore needlessly fear death.
Until I sought answers and discovered the teachings and wisdom above, I too was scared. I was scared of the lack of answers to one of the most fundamental questions of existence.
Does death mean the extinction of life, or instead the extension of life by other means? Now I truly believe in the latter.
My quest brings me solace.
I learned to embrace the art of dying.
I admire little fluffy clouds as they pass through the heavens.
I admire shooting, dying stars that fall to earth to become part of us.
I talk to my dead parents; in their altered, cosmic states.
I sometimes ask for help.
And sometimes miracles happen.
