What is Beyond The Fear of Dying?
I sit here next to my dear friend’s bed in hospice care. I share this experience with you because we (I as well) rarely talk openly about the approaching days of death that we all face, many years from now or within days. We deny it, run from it, have surgery to postpone it, buy skin creams to fix our wrinkles, and are ashamed enough to lie about our age.
But in these days with my friend, slowly, quietly, as I walk through my own feelings and tears at times, I find a peace, a welcomed rest from the exhausting denial of death. This peace comes from being in deeper touch with the timeless, beyond the daily ups and downs of human drama and identifying with it all. Joining her in these days down this path, helps me sense beyond the veil of time, beyond the veil of this world. Beyond even the idea of death. And yet simultaneously I feel the richness of feelings and the tenderness of my own heart. I ask myself, are my relationships healed within me as much as possible? Anybody I need to say “I love you” to – if even within my own soul? Any grudge I need to free myself of? Any forgiveness of myself to be done?
She sleeps, peacefully. Her chest slowly rising and falling. When she’s awake, her body is weaker than the past, with slower speech, less strength, more effort to access memory, and yet. And yet, when she sees a loving face, even a stranger, or a familiar nurse, or a friend who drops by, or she hears a voice of a loved one on the phone, the light of her being emanates brightly, even if just with her eyes. Her soul wells up and she almost returns to full vibrancy, if only her body could. Love and connection seem to have a fire in it. She’s still fiesty at times and ornery, and still with a voice, although weak, that has love and sometimes that bite of her personality. But more and more she’s quiet, resting, even still. I too, sit and if I let go for a moment of what I “need to be doing out there in the world in ‘my’ life”, I find a regenerative and welcome stillness, a return to now, as if resting in the loving arms of God, timeless and comforting. In these moments, I feel an honoring of the primordial appearance of life and death – yet deeply within my very being I feel the essence and nourishment of the unchanging timeless.
If you are dealing with a dying loved one or facing your own “ending days”, I hope these words offer some comfort for your soul.