We begin life with an abundance of energy and curiosity. We also appear to have little sense of our mortality. This could derive from a biological immunisation against the fear of death. Alternatively, children's inability to comprehend life's impermanence may be a consequence of their lack of experience, and of the fact that they are not yet capable of analytical reflection. They have little interest in exploring the twin facts of death and dying: nor have they the ability to do so.

      Children rarely appreciate the significance of death or dying. Confronted with death, they may find it intriguing. It will fascinate them briefly, but they will be quickly distracted. It is difficult for children to recognise the pain and debility associated with dying. Nor do they realise that death is permanent.

Facing our mortality

      Coming to terms with death is a life-long process. Despite the fact that we are surrounded by evidence of our mortality, we delay paying attention to this evidence.

      There is a sense in which coming to terms with our mortality is age-appropriate. Adolescents often display a reckless disregard for their lives. They taunt the Grim Reaper. They appear unaware of their vulnerability, of the permanence of death and of the damage, short of death, that they are capable of doing to themselves.

      If facing our mortality is a life-long process, so too is coming to terms with the process of dying.

      Accidents and life-threatening illnesses accelerate the journey for some. This acceleration is most noticeable in the young. Mary d'Apice relates the story of a thirteen-year-old who wrote a letter to doctors and nurses working in the hospital where he was dying. He explained that most people didn't like talking about dying and assured those caring for him that he was aware of their [133] insecurity. However, so long as they cared, they couldn't go wrong. He didn't want answers, just their presence. He was afraid and wanted someone to hold his hand. He explained that he had never died before.¹

      The fact that life gives us the opportunity to come to terms with death and dying does not mean that we accept the opportunity.

At a distance

      Previous generations lived with death and dying as ever-present realities.

      I remember the first occasion I visited Hobart, in Tasmania. I saw gravestones from the initial settlement bearing the names of infants and young children. Infant mortality does not stare us in the face as starkly as it did earlier generations. We do not have to make allowance for the fact that some of our children will die before reaching adulthood.

      Nevertheless, we are saturated with visual images of death and dying in news and current affairs broadcasts. However, this over-exposure, which is one stage removed from the experiences depicted, dulls our sensitivity.

      The fact that we are not more immediately confronted by death and dying is due, in part, to advances in medical science--to mass inoculation, to the availability of sophisticated surgical procedures and to antibiotic and genetic therapies. An adequate diet also contributes to our longevity.

      The fact that most Western countries have not been devastated by the carnage of war in more recent years has also shielded many Westerners from the nightmare of saturation bombing, invasion and the consequent loss of life. While television brings home to us the horrors of war, few have experienced this horror first hand.

Denial

      Because we are less directly faced with death, we are better able to deny it. [134]

      Sogyal Rinpoche, in describing the death-denying ethos of the West, commented that most lived in terror of death--which meant annihilation and loss. For some, death evoked a morbidity, while in others, it led to naive cheerfulness and blind optimism.² The West is in denial over the inevitability of death, which has become the new pornography.

      Western civilisation is built on a denial of death. Immortality projects abound. Our materialism, our striving after wealth, is one such project. The passion for species survival, reflected in the myth of scientific progress, is another. The grand statements that we make in the monuments we construct are a further reflection of this craving.

      We seek to immortalise ourselves in our children. We are also tempted to re-live our lives through them.

      The indications of our propensity to deny death are many.

      Social etiquette has conspired with the fear of death to remove evidence of death and dying from public view. Children, in particular, are shielded from confrontation with death. While there is an element of appropriateness in this, our response is as much a reflection of our discomfort, our fear and our inability to face death maturely.

      I remember, as a child, being taken into my paternal grandfather's bedroom to view his body after he had died. On another occasion, when one of my uncles died, my auntie called my father, asking for his help. Stan was slumped across the steering wheel of his car in a garage at the back of his house. I was 15 at the time. I accompanied my father to the house. We slipped into the front seat of the car, from either side, supporting my Uncle's body between us. My father drove the car out of the garage. We eventually manoeuvred my uncle out of the front seat and carried him inside. These experiences, though somewhat traumatic for a youngster, were a great education. They dispelled the notion that death was abnormal.

      Our inclination to deny the reality of death is also evident in the euphemisms we use to describe it. [135]

      We also read our fear of death in our passionate commitment to youthfulness and in our reluctance to admit to our age until we are old enough to boast about it.

      Our society values people for their usefulness. The young still have their lives before them and are valued because they are useful. The aged, who are debilitated, are considered useless.³ It is little wonder that we strive to deny our aging.

      Those, whose self-esteem is associated with roles they fulfil in the family and in society, find it difficult to face the challenge to their identity that the relinquishing of these roles entails.

      While it is important for the aged to retain their enthusiasm, passion and creativity, the attempt to disguise physical indications of ageing through cosmetic subterfuge represents unhealthy denial.

      The fact that we intentionally segregate the aged in hostels and nursing homes, a practice that has become necessary in our frenetically busy society, further contributes to our flight from reality into illusion, and our denial of death. This denial is also reflected in the funeral industry's sanitising of death.

Why the fear?

      Why do we fear death?

      We are caught up in a genetically driven, evolutionary passion for group and species survival. We also fear death because the unknown terrifies us. The media, because of the nature of the news it presents, focuses on violent, gruesome death scenes. We shy away from death because of its association with loss, grief, anger, and guilt. We are also concerned about how we will die. Death terrifies us because it represents a curtailment of opportunities for self-expression and self-fulfilment.

      The decline in religious belief, and the consequent transfer of the immortality project from the afterlife to the here-and-now, has also helped fuel our denial of death. A different attitude informs the behaviour of those who retain a belief in the afterlife. An extreme expression of this is the confident fervour of young Islamic fundamentalists vying with each other for the privilege of [136] martyrdom in a holy jihad.⁴ Whatever we think of religious fundamentalism, such behaviour is in stark contrast to the West's tacit assumption that death is the end.

      Our denial of death is also evident in the counter-intuitive assumption that we will one-day discover the elixir of youth. In anticipation of such a breakthrough, some have had their bodies snap-frozen in liquid nitrogen.

      Elizabeth Kubler-Ross has argued that one of the reasons for our difficulty in facing death is related to the mechanical, dehumanised way in which death has been treated in hospitals, where patients are hooked up to an array of tubes and machines.⁵

      Our fear of death and dying is also a consequence of the fact that most live their lives out of the ego. Few have discovered the deeper self, in which their true identity is grounded. When our identity is rooted in the bodyself, we are not only benefited by a sense of enduring identity; we also experience a connectedness with the Spirit. This Spirit suffuses us with a sense of timelessness. It is the grasping ego, locked into a persisting insecurity, that fears the dissolution that death threatens. Sogyal Rinpoche has argued that we are afraid of death because we have no idea who we are.⁶

      In the West we worship a style of efficiency associated with hyperactive freneticism. Our hyper-activity is fuelled by our insecurity. Lacking contact with the deeper self, we have not learned to flow with the Dao, with the Spirit, with the seasons of our lives.

Realism

      We need to recover a realistic perspective on death and dying.

      There is a wonderful Zen story about a wealthy man who asked a Zen monk to create a work of calligraphy for him. The monk wrote, "Father dies, Son dies, Grandson dies". The man who had commissioned the parchment was incensed. However, the monk explained that if his sons predeceased him, and his grandsons died before his sons, he would have reason to be [137] unhappy. On the other hand, if family succession proceeded regularly, he could scarcely complain.⁷

      The suggestion that we give attention to death and dying is not intended to foster ghoulishness. Nor is it an excuse for the abusive manipulation of frightening imagery to scare people into religious commitment.

      There is a double-directionality about life and death. On the one hand, life, beginning at birth, can be seen to be headed towards death. Viewed from the opposite perspective, death can be seen to impact us from the future, to overshadow our existence and to frame our lives in the context of our inevitable demise.

      Because death is inevitable, there is benefit in our approaching life from the point of view that this recognition affords. It is one of the most profound of life's paradoxes that we need to begin at the end, to shape our approach to life in the light of the fact that we will one day die.

Dying

      While all religious traditions give consideration to death and dying, Tibetan Buddhism has made them a central focus.

      It divides human existence into four periods--life, dying and death, the period after death and rebirth. These are referred to as the four bardos.⁸

      Tibetan Buddhist monks spend their lives preparing for the process of dying. Rather than diminishing their capacity for living, this anticipation enhances it. It also means that, when they come to die, they are familiar with the transitions they will encounter. They usually enjoy the assistance of a master, who guides them through the process.

      Sogyal Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist master, while still a young boy, witnessed the death of Lama Tseten, a very human, impressive and grandfatherly individual.

      Rinpoche commented that Tseten's death was extraordinary. Accompanied by Khandro, whom he was tutoring, Tseten died in a tent outside the walls of the monastery, completely composed. When Khandro rushed [138] out of the tent to fetch Tseten's master to accompany him through the stages of dying, he called her back. He had so realised the presence of his master, Jamyang Khyentse, within himself, that he had no need of his physical presence.⁹

Benefits

      Taking death and dying into account, as inevitable and healthy aspects of living, would hugely impact our lives.

      It would result in a rearrangement of our priorities. This is reflected in the prayer of the Psalmist who asked to be reminded of the brevity of life so that he would be motivated to pursue wisdom.¹⁰

      Sogyal Rinpoche argues that there are two forms of laziness, one Western, and the other Eastern. Eastern wisdom he equates with laziness, with hanging around and avoiding physical effort. Western laziness is associated with compulsive behaviour, with the frenetic avoidance of substantive issues.¹¹

      The only way to overcome this Western laziness is to learn to live in anticipation of our death. The impact this would have on our lives was pointed up by a story narrated by Adi Da. It concerns one's man's visit to a sage, who was also a king. The man was taken on a tour of the palace accompanied by a swordsman. He carried a bowl of water. If he spilt even a drop the swordsman was instructed to sever his head from his body. Realising that death was an ever-present possibility changed his relationship to everything.¹²

      If we took death and dying into account we would learn to live in an anticipation of these inevitabilities. As the French essayist, Montaigne, argued, we should familiarise ourselves with death, thus depriving it of its stangeness. We should anticipate it everywhere. To befriend death, in this way, is to be free. If we do not learn how to die, we remain slaves.¹³

      Keeping in mind the reality of our own death and dying would help us prepare for both. Neither would be experienced as altogether strange. A matter of fact familiarity with death is [139] captured by the Australian poet Bruce Dawe, in a poem written on the occasion of the death of his mother-in-law. The family was gathered around an outside barbecue. His mother-in-law suddenly slumped forward, falling out of her chair onto the ground, hamburger in hand.¹⁴

Death as a goal

      There is a world of difference between regarding death as an end, and considering it a goal. The goal is etched into the texture of our bodies. As Jung argued, we begin the journey towards death the moment we pass the meridian.¹⁵

      Becoming comfortable with the inevitability of our death and dying also helps us surrender to the process. Surrender differs from capitulation. One capitulates to an enemy under duress. Surrendering to death is like surrendering to an embrace.

      Mary d'Apice argues that we become, in our senior years, what we have made ourselves as a consequence of past decisions.¹⁶ If what we have become, by intention or default, has not prepared us for death, we will struggle against the Grim Reaper till the end.

      If death is the goal for which we prepare, we will not fight it, but surrender to it. This will be a surrender to the Spirit, whose energies constitute our physical and spiritual existence. If this is the case, we can, as Rahner suggests, take an active role in our dying, making a free choice for or against God in our dying. In this sense, death is not something thrust upon us, but rather an act that we perform.¹⁷

      To surrender in our dying involves us letting go of things. Most of us are reluctant to cease our grasping. We have long imagined that grasping will bring us happiness. However, it is in letting go that we discover freedom.¹⁸ By learning to let go of things, through the course of our lives, we prepare for the final letting-go.¹⁹

      Living with the knowledge of our death and dying would also develop in us greater respect for the aged, in fact, for all people, as we are all locked into the process. It would nurture understanding, empathy, and gentleness. It would also critique many of the unhealthy aspects of our civilisation, like our [140] propensity to damage the eco-system that supports us. Ironically, fear of death helps fuel this destructiveness.²⁰

Preparing

      How do we prepare for death and dying?

      It would be presumptuous of me, in answering this question, to set myself up as an authority. I do, however, have a few suggestions.

      Honing our perceptiveness, and our capacity for self-reflection, helps. Taking the time to look at ourselves realistically, is also an advantage. Committing ourselves to working intentionally on our maturation, which will decrease the dictatorship of the ego, is an excellent preparation for the final letting-go. As Mary d'Apice commented, life of full of opportunities to rehearse this final act of self-surrender.²¹ Dialoguing with our bodies also assists us. They bear eloquent testimony to processes at work within us.

      If we are serious about preparing for death and dying, the aged, and the dying, are our best teachers. When we are there for them, they will also there for us. We will find ourselves the privileged recipients of their experience. It is little wonder that those involved in hospice work find it enriching. I am indebted to the many people in whose dying I have shared.

A knowing!

      My mother died several years ago. I remember her mentioning, at a family get-together at Christmas, several months before she died, that she felt that it would not be long before she left us. Although she was 85, she was in good health, and there was no obvious reason for her to make this comment. Her family had a history of longevity.

      My mother's death occurred as a consequence of being knocked over on the footpath outside her home by a young boy on a bike. Thrown off balance, she hit her head on the corner of the concrete footpath. [141]

      It is difficult to explain her anticipation of her death. A comment by Hillman hints at an explanation. He argues that our daimon, our guiding spirit, is aware of when we will die and begins preparing us.²²

The process

      We will be prepared for death and the process of dying by exploring what happens as we proceed through the dying process.

      In one sense, we have to admit that we cannot know, absolutely, what will happen until we make the journey. While there is a considerable literature detailing near-death experiences, we don't know whether these experiences are merely a function of neural excitation in the brain, or whether they represent the experience of a dimension of reality that lies beyond the limits of normal perception and scientific verification. While I am inclined to favour the latter interpretation, I must be honest and admit that the jury is still out on the issue.

      Adi Da, speaking about death, argued that those who are "awake", who are in touch with their eternal reality, do not confuse this reality with the individual body-mind, which has been mocked up, as a sort of electronic entity, to serve them for this brief lifetime. At death, this body-mind dissolves, while the eternal reality returns to its original state, a state in which it has always been living, with or without this particular body-mind.²³ However, the discovery of this eternal reality is a process that has engaged the attention of very few.

A prayer

      Perhaps it is appropriate that we look to Teilhard de Chardin, Jesuit priest and palaeontologist, for a final comment. In a prayer, anticipating the process of death and decay, he asked God to help him appreciate that the descent towards old age, and the experience of death, which appeared in the guise of an alien power that threatened to diminish him, was, in reality, the activity of his God, gently parting the fibres of his being in preparation for a final transformation.²⁴ [142]

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