Do you fear death?

[Garth33]

I don't fear death but it would be terribly inconvenient.

speaking for DEATH, I would have to say...SORRY! but you're OUTTA HERE!

 

[Garth33]

all kidding aside...the worst thing, I think is WAITING for death. Almost a year ago, my stepdad got really sick and it turned out to be terminal. His exit went A LOT LONGER than even he wanted....and he said so many times but what could be done? nothing...but I know there was nothing in his last 2 weeks I would have wanted to live for after I'd basically said goodbye to everyone. They didn't need to see me feeble and barely hanging onto life...at that point...just give me a needle and I'll inject myself to end it all. Stupid in 2009 we don't see that but now I suppose I stirred up all the bible thumpers so I'll check out...

Peace,
G33

 

[prepstudinsc]

I'm calling bullshit on everyone who says they do not fear death. Maybe your ego does not, but your being does. It is why you avoid going into the hood at 2 am. Fear is a survival mechanism that we all have. Just because you are at peace with death and accept it as the final outcome and it doesn't impede your life, doesn't mean (to me IMO) that you still do not fear it. If you were sitting on the couch with your family and a couple robbers came in guns blazing you would be shook and scared for your life. You wouldn't sit back and light up a j.

I'm not scared of death, but I'm scared of how it might come. I don't want to waste away from some terminal illness like cancer. I've had several close relatives spend terrible last days suffering because of cancer. I want to just die in my sleep--close my eyes on earth and wake up in another dimension.

I'm not scared of the hood. I work in the hood and have a lot of interaction there.

Being scared by having a robber hold a gun at your head is totally different than being scared of death. It is a case of being scared at how you will die. Death is a release, it's peace, it's healing, it's paradise unlike being sick for a long time, or being stabbed and lying in a pool of your own blood for hours while you slowly and painfully die alone.

 

[B_Think_Kink]

I think everyone is afraid of dying, whether they admit it or not. If they weren't afraid of it, they would be dead. Avoiding death is a survival instinct. If you weren't afraid of death you wouldn't avoid hitting the tree in front of you in your car. You wouldn't hide from a tornado coming at you.

If you truly are not afraid of death, then you are more likely afraid of living. People who aren't afraid of dying act reckless, or fly planes into buildings.

I do not fear death, I wake up every morning wishing I had died. I am into reckless things. Take a look at my blog, my drug enhanced lifestyle clearly does not show me being scared of death. I welcome it.

 

[Bbucko]

I'm calling bullshit on everyone who says they do not fear death. Maybe your ego does not, but your being does. It is why you avoid going into the hood at 2 am. Fear is a survival mechanism that we all have. Just because you are at peace with death and accept it as the final outcome and it doesn't impede your life, doesn't mean (to me IMO) that you still do not fear it. If you were sitting on the couch with your family and a couple robbers came in guns blazing you would be shook and scared for your life. You wouldn't sit back and light up a j.

I also think people are mixing up what "fear" really is. "Fear" isn't setting an alarm clock so you don't get robbed; that is being obsessive and/or paranoid.

Fear is an emotional response to threats and danger.

I believe a more accurate question would be; do you have or suffer from anxiety regarding death?

The instinct for self-preservation is more an assertion of one's right to life than fear of death. If someone came in with guns blazing, I'd be afraid of being shot: at that high-adrenaline moment, the logical outcome of death is many steps removed from what goes through your mind.

I was mugged once by a guy with a knife a long time ago. My heart was racing not because I thought I'd die, but because I knew I was at risk of being stabbed. But even more instinctual than that, it was being caught off guard and unprepared. When one's situation changes in an instant (one moment walking home from a party, the next being held against a chain-link fence with a knife under my nose by a much taller man who was shaking uncontrollably), it's a feeling of loss of control, which is terrifying enough. It's telling that, as it was happening, all I could think of was how stupid I'd been to insist on walking home and not taking a cab. It wasn't about death per se, which didn't enter my mind, but rather being suddenly at the whim of a crazy man. Only later did it occur to me that I could have died, and at that stage in my life (I was in my mid-late 20s), death did terrify me.

I'll also second what been said here about a slow, painful, wasting death: that's the way people usually die of AIDS complications. It's a death delivered by thousands of small, humiliating cuts, not a sudden blow. I've always said to myself that I've lived life by my own rules and will choose death by my own rules when the time is right. I reserve the right to select that time for myself, not have it attached to some doctor's ego or my loved one's fear of grief. Those in my (very small) immediate circle understand this and are supportive of my ideals.

 

[Smartalk]

Why should anyone fear death, after all it is only the physical body that dies, the subtle mind remains and moves on. It is like a bird flying from one nest to another, the body is just a vehicle nothing more. As it has already said, one thing is certain in this life, at some unknown point we will die. If we were to think each morning, as we awake, “I might die today”, then we will make the most of every passing moment rather than wasting our time thinking what am I going to do tomorrow, next week, next year. We should learn to live in the 'now' life will become more meaningful.

If anyone is interested their has been a lot of research in to Near Death Experience and past live. I would recommend a series of books written by a Dr Brian Weiss Chairman Emeritus of Psychiatry at the Mount Sinai Medical Centre in Miami.
What he discovered as a result of his work went totally against his medical and scientific understanding. http://www.brianweiss.com/ This is a very natural phenomenon if only we would just, stop, take time out, and give it some in depth thought. Go on, I invite you try it, let know what thoughts come into your mind

 

[D_Kissimmee Coldsore]

Well with everyone preaching their beliefs as fact in this thread, let me join in.

When I die, I will cease to exist completely and utterly in every sense. I will have my body donated to medical research and that will be the end of me. How I will live on, seeing as there is no afterlife, will be in what I have achieved in life and how I have affected (hopefully in a good way) those I have met and perhaps even how I have changed the world for the better. Who knows.

So it isn't dying that I fear, because it is inevitable and once it happens I'll know nothing of it. I am worried that I may simply die and have made no mark on the world. That is my fear.

 

[B_starinvestor]

I'm not scared of death, but I'm scared of how it might come. I don't want to waste away from some terminal illness like cancer. I've had several close relatives spend terrible last days suffering because of cancer. I want to just die in my sleep--close my eyes on earth and wake up in another dimension.

I'm not scared of the hood. I work in the hood and have a lot of interaction there.

Being scared by having a robber hold a gun at your head is totally different than being scared of death. It is a case of being scared at how you will die. Death is a release, it's peace, it's healing, it's paradise unlike being sick for a long time, or being stabbed and lying in a pool of your own blood for hours while you slowly and painfully die alone.

Well put.

 

[whatireallywant]

I've also come close to dying, and for me what I fear now is that kind of excruciating PAIN again!

However, although my logical mind says it's not there to fear, I was raised around a lot of Bible-thumpers and had a lot of hellfire and brimstone preached at me. I now believe that a "loving" God would not sentence people to ETERNAL TORTURE, but a part of me is still, "But what if I'm wrong? What if there IS a hell, and I AM SENT THERE!"

As far as losing family members, my mom died 3 months ago and it's probably fortunate in its way that she died suddenly and quickly, although it was a shock for all of us (including her co-workers - she'd gone to work the day before she died - and that shows just HOW sudden it was!) I can't help thinking though that she got her wish to not waste away and have to live in a nursing home, which if she had somewhat recovered from the stroke that killed her, she would most likely have had to do that.

 

[Northland]

I have feared death at the times when my health was about as far removed from death as possible.

It's interesting, about a year ago at this time (the time this thread was created, I was looking through posts made while I was medicalized), my condition was very touch and go. Heavily medicated and with a couple of tubes and an IV drip, there was a sense of peace and serenity. In conversations with visitors (not that I recall them- that is, the conversations), I was apparently informing them of my imminent demise and how it was okay and that I'd had my time on Earth, if it was time to go then that was what it would be, no fear. It wasn't that I was determined to die, I just wasn't upset by the prospect. My concerns, even as the meds wore off, were to those about me.

I recall the entry into the hospital, as the ambulance attendants took me in, I knew deep down this might be it, I just hoped I'd hang on long enough to bid a farewell to those who meant so much to me. As it turned out, I was ahead of schedule for departure, although checking the Social Security Death Records list, I found a person with my exact name did die during that time. It's sort of how death seems to work, when reading obituaries, I am often surprised by the number of persons with the same first name (I am talking less common names) suddenly showing up, or similar last names. I have a feeling the Grim Reaper has a system of alphabetization which is used for making collections.

So, no fear of death, when the time arrives, it arives.

 

[invisibleman]

Simple question(s), Do you fear death? If so why?
I do not fear it all that much. Nothing I can do to stop it and it will be a once in a life time thing. I ask my sister this today and she said she hasd a fear of death because of the un-known, well I look at it like this. If there is an after life you will know when you die. And if not how will you know? you're dead. Anyone else agree?

You know what...
I don't fear dying. I believe that there is an afterlife. If I find out after dying, there is no afterlife...it doesn't really matter...I am dead. People won't remember who I am long after I am gone from my mortal coil.

I have had a great life...to a point. There are many people who have walked this earth and lived their lives to a point.

There are a lot of people with interesting life experiences who have died. There are a lot of people with uninteresting boring lives who died.

If I were to die now or tomorrow,
I would hope that people would live their lives as best as they could. Be attuned to everything--Good and bad. You never know.

Don't take life for granted. Don't waste time with stupid ass people.

 

[rob_just_rob]

Death is my bitch.

I fear the death of others much more than my own death.