If you're expecting a whimsical story about how We should take those trips we imagine we'd take! Fly to those exotic places! Jump out of airplanes! Climb Mount Everest! If you're expecting sweet and sentimental ideas about spending more time with the people we love or appreciating the small miracles in life, well for any of those things I can recommend a variety of movies and books; some really excellent ones too. In fact, I would be surprised if you couldn't do the same for me. There is a vast wealth of literature and theater on the subject as most people have asked the question "What would I do if I only had one more day/month/year to live?" Just as they've thought about what they would do if they won the lottery, or inherited millions. Or got stranded on a deserted Island.
We spend a great deal of time fantasizing about things that we never actually expect to happen. We don't really think we'll ever hit the big one or receive a letter in the mail about "Uncle Charlie" leaving a fortune to us in his will. We definitely don't believe that we're likely to survive a boat wreck or a plane crash and float on debris to an uninhabited place where no one can find us.
And we also don't seem to truly believe that we are going to die.
"Don't be silly dreemit, we know we're going to die!"
Do you? Are you certain of that? If you've ever asked yourself the question I posed in my title and answered it with fantasies unrealized and did not go out and realize these fantasies- then you may need to reconsider.
"Ha! Gotcha there dreemit, I have a bucket list and I've been checking it off!"
"That's great! But is it really because you know that death is hanging over your shoulder?"
I am not inside your head, so if you say Yes! then I'll take you at your word. But here's the thing..I too made a bucket list after asking myself this question, and I too have been checking it off. And had you questioned whether I truly understood I was going to depart this earth after the first, second, probably even third box I marked, I may have said "Of course, that's the point isn't it? I thought about the things I really wanted to do in this life and I'm doing them."
Don't get me wrong, figuring out the things you want to do in this life and then actually doing them is awesome. I think everyone should make a list of those things they want to experience and start checking off the boxes, (or just do those things as they occur to you, even better) just as I think everyone should ask themselves what they really want out of this life and do what they can to achieve it. But what I've recently realized is that doing the things we want to do and becoming who we want to become does not necessarily mean we comprehend that we are going to die, it only means that we figured out how we wanted to live. Which is excellent, but not what I mean to discuss in this post.
"Then what do you mean to discuss, dreemit?"
I want to tell you why it is I think that the majority of humankind does not seem to get that this place is temporary, that the time here is limited, that not only are we going to exit this plane- it could happen at any moment. We have lots of sayings like Here today Gone tomorrow, and intellectually people understand them. But they don't know them to be true.
I've made a habit of contemplating it regularly, but I still forget I'm going to die. And when I forget I get annoyed over petty nonsense, and sometimes even involved in it. But the larger issues of life I see quite clearly now. And when the majority of humankind starts realizing their death on a regular basis, perhaps they too will evolve past color and creed and race and sexuality, and we will see an end to hatred and violence and war.
If you are using phrases like White power and Black lives matter, you do not truly know you are going to die . If you are using the labels: Black, white, christian, jew, liberal, conservative, homosexual, heterosexual- then you do not truly know you are going to die. They are nothing more than letters formed into words that are used to cause division. And they have nothing to do with me. And to me they have nothing to do with you. And because of that I love you all. Because in this moment I comprehend my death, I know that I truly do love you all. You have no color or race or creed, you are simply spirits trapped in uniquely decorated costumes that we call bodies.
And maybe you'll never truly know that you are going to die, so you will continue making these distinctions and using these labels. You'll continue getting angry and having wars. And this is the part in a piece like this where people normally make a big point, hand on hip, head shaking in disapproval. Then perhaps say some really inspiring words that make people think for at least a minute or two after they've finished reading.
Note: If you truly know you are going to die you will have solved this game. If you don't, when we all get Home you will most likely suffer....huge amounts of razzing and victory dances. And you might have to do the game over until you too think it's utterly absurd that we fight wars over different colored costumes and 'my legend is better than your legend.'
I said I wasn't going to discuss the bit on doing the things we want to do and becoming who we want to become, and I'm not, but I am going to post my brother's song about it. Off his album 'experience' I give you Before it's too late
