Comments on: Practicing with the Fear of Dying http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/ Tue, 26 Jul 2011 00:28:03 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Maura http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-434 Mon, 30 Nov 2009 08:01:30 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-434 “Hello, teacher. What have you got for me today?”

Lew, thank you for this. I’d like to memorize and repeat daily what you said in your blog about not averting from negative emotion. As you note, this teaching can help us with more than fear, more than the five defined fears . . . .

]]> By: lewrich http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-407 Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:50:33 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-407 Death is our constant companion. So is life.

]]> By: John http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-405 Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:02:17 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-405 Got up this Saturday morning, later than usual, slept in to 0715, foggy outside, not the cause of my rest… got out on the deck, collected an armload of firewood, and loaded up the stove to get the house warmed up over 68 degrees F. Went into the kitchen to get a cup of coffee ( I’m gettin’ there ) looked up on the ceiling, for some reason, and saw a spider. Got a container, with a lid, caught the eight legged wander, and released it out side. One life is like any other, if treated that way.

]]> By: John http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-403 Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:40:50 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-403 Hi,

I work as a nurse in an ICU, and death is something that people deny, continually, otherwise we wouldn’t be there, or here, as I have just brought it up as my “touching dying” experience, is experienced each time I set foot in the hospital, to help heal body/mind/spirit, if one in the same, mine is as yours.

]]> By: lewrich http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-402 Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:47:40 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-402 Benjamin Franklin is famous for having said (in connection with signing the Declaration of Independence, which made all the signers subject to execution by the English crown)

“The prospect of the hangman’s noose focuses the mind wonderfully.”

I didn’t think of this as a spiritual or meditation instruction, but it could be! The practice of “Mindfulness of Death” is a venerable and traditional meditation practice, very much as PattyE has described. Thank you!

]]> By: PattyE http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-400 Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:53:35 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-400 Last night I learned my favorite English teacher died from cancer a year ago. I was deeply saddned by this news not so much that I would miss her but that I wonder if she knew how much she affected my life and how appreciative I am for our interactions as student and teacher. This morning my meditation took me to the space of imagining I was recently diagnosed and only had a short time to live. My mind became very focused, clear and vivid. What an unexpected gift from saddness. Thank you Mrs. Underwood.

]]> By: Rebecca http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-399 Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:46:40 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-399 “You can talk to your unconscious, it is always listening.” I’ve only begun to get a sense of this, but it is very intriguing.

“The actual ‘taste’ of anxiety is just a sensation, like the sourness of a lemon…” Well, this is what I hope for and I think I can see that I might get there, but I’m not there yet. At least, I don’t berate myself for feeling anxious any more and that’s a step forward.

]]> By: Barbara Banthien http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-398 Mon, 16 Nov 2009 04:22:45 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-398 Thank you. This is a beautiful teaching. I will carry it with me.

]]> By: Rico Provasoli http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-397 Sun, 15 Nov 2009 22:24:51 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-397 My practice uses this principle of accepting what is with little spin or interpretation. I have found it very useful to apply this practice especially to good news. When it looks like good fortune is coming my way, I practice welcoming it neutrally. Good, bad so what? What is, is what is here, now.
It is my egocentric contraction and interpretation which causes me to suffer. And we are here (hopefully) to end suffering.

]]> By: Katherine http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/2009/11/14/practicing-with-the-fear-of-dying/#comment-396 Sun, 15 Nov 2009 19:41:45 +0000 http://agingasaspiritualpractice.com/?p=484#comment-396 When my sister died at 51, I was 47, in the midst of a busy life, raising two daughters and establishing my career as a college professor. When people said to me, “It will take you a while to get over her death,” I always responded, “I’ll never get over her death. It has transformed me.” I didn’t really know at the time what that transformation would look like. Four years later, I found myself at a residential care hospice, taking the training to be a volunteer. Eight years later, I am still there, four hours a week, talking to dying people and their families, listening to their fears, their sorrow, and reminding myself that death comes to us all. It is an amazingly meaningful practice, and it’s helped me come to terms with my enormous fear of death. Being with dying in that ongoing way reminds me of the importance of today.

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