Meaning Through Finitude

My soul implores me to reflect deeply within and ascertain how much of my peace and self-control was a result of my experiential reality and how much of my being was a product of my efforts to become a functioning, living being. I rarely ponder my mortality, albeit each day brings me closer to the inevitable, the doorway to nothingness closing up on me. Perhaps every so often, when I get knocked off by an ailment or learn of the death of a loved one or someone my age. Maybe it occurs to me after a near accident, or perhaps in the middle of the night when I cannot fall asleep and have to face the angst of my impending mortality.

I seldom mull the likelihood that such an ominous threat looms over my shoulder. However, in the past couple of years, notably during the COVID-19 pandemic, it has extended for years beyond what I imagined it would be. I became much more self-conscious of my mortality, realizing that I had gotten undeviatingly circumspect because of the added uncertainty surrounding my health and the nebulous assurance of when my life would return to normal. Because there can be no peace where there is uncertainty—death being the only certainty, and therefore in my quest for peace, I have to rob it of its peculiarity by becoming a routine visitor and stay acquainted with its nature, not only in my mind but also on my lips—I contemplate it regularly—at each passing instant, recalling it and allowing my creativeness to relish itself in all its manifestations. Let the time be what it is; I routinely tell myself—this has evolved into my daily ritual, a wild goose chase for peace.

It is a well-established fact that experiencing a near-death experience increases one's acceptance of death and decreases one's fear of it. To my mind, the experience itself takes you to the depth of your very quintessence, where you feel as if you are teetering on the precipice of your beingness, where the sensation of fear quickly reaches a pinnacle and then disbands most unexpectedly, leaving you with a hollowness that is both evocative and terrifying. When the fear subsides, it materializes as anxiety, which never seems to wither. Rather than that, it generates a sense of appreciation that merely a few have ever come to experience, and that sense of gratitude prevails over any sentiments of dread at that moment. Because only those who have been there frankly understand the notion of what it means to be alive. To embrace death is to embrace life and the freedom it gainfully utilized in the person of yourself. A man who has taught himself how to die has unversed and untutored himself from being a slave. Even if a man does all he can to avoid being caught by the grim reaper, death will force him to raise his dwindling head while walking through his dissolution.

To live to one's full extent, one must consider one's limits, the most critical of which is the finite and indeterminate time we are rightfully allotted—the ephemeral character of nature itself. Failure to recognize and live under this limitation is one of our most tragic proclivities, as it usually causes individuals to renounce or subvert the present in the erroneous notion that there will always be a future where one may be able to set themselves straight—to amend their mistakes. Understand that every momentous decision I make comes with a prohibitive cost, and that cost is how much of my life I am willing to atone in making it worthwhile and avoid frittering my stint on pursuits that add no nominal value to my existence. While acknowledging my mortality has been challenging, it does not alter the reality that death is an unavoidable aspect of my existential experience—a natural consequence of birth.

I am undeterred by the constant reminder that a paradigm shift in my attitude about death is strictly necessary and that there is nowise tremendous fortune than the present we are so blessed to experience directly. This realization instilled a sense of urgency and taught me that my existence could not be stalled or suspended. Waiting for a perfect future while living on borrowed time is never the optimal strategy since my life expectancy dwindles with each passing day.

My birth and my death are two distinct moments in time. Between these two epochs of transition, life continues to advance, implying that each day brings me closer to my ultimate extinction and that progression never comes to a halt until the day I give up my ghost. When I consider death, I find that it strengthens my bonds with both myself and others. I understood how precarious life is for everyone I cherished, since we are all strung together by the same thin thread—turning to those closest to you for help when neighboring death is natural. However, the people I care about can not keep me unassailable from death, and my profound and intimate relationships may instead create pain and despair, making death far more challenging to bear. My loved ones are powerless and inferior in the face of my death, and so am I in theirs. No matter how affable and capable they are, they can not stop me from dying, nor will I stop them. Regardless of who or what I associate with, death will invariably triumph. And, given that my friends could not thwart death from embezzling me, I wonder what will genuinely aid me in my death? Although I have yet to arrive at an answer, such a question has undoubtedly benefited my contemplation of death. And because I do not know when I will see my loved ones once again, I cherish the present with them even more, rather than lamenting that they cannot help me circumvent death.

While life offers the possibility of fortuity, death symbolizes the futility of any such fortuity—acting as the ultimate end to an individual's existence and any hope and dream such an individual has. The angst of death profoundly affects how I feel inside every minute of my existence. It subtly influences my demeanor and forms my perspective. It must be adequately inhibited for the benefit of my well-being. Ignoring death rejects one's nature and results in an ever-increasing limitation of awareness and forbearance. However, accepting death is a life-saving notion, considering it allows one to go past fear and affliction and into a more authentic kind of livelihood, a reasonable or justifiable sense of one's worth or importance. It is a concept that does not imprison but rather liberates once you embrace it.