I don’t know if it’s a common thing or not but when I was little, I used to lay in bed at night and think about dying. The idea of death terrified me. I’d like to think this is normal, but I’m not sure. I wasn’t exactly a normal kid.
I know Scarlett thinks about it, because she’s talked to me about dying already (see image below). Gianna though, has never said a word. Doesn’t mean it hasn’t crossed her mind, but she’s never really questioned me on what happens after the heart stops beating. The closest we get to talking about it is singing the Dead song from South Park. Because we are those types of parents where no topic is off limits for joking.
So when I was younger, I would lay in my bed for what seemed like hours. My anxiety building as I circled around the thought that someday I would just cease to exist. That this body, in all its imperfections, wouldn’t last. That I didn’t know when my time would come, but only that it someday would. I would lay there….and want to cry. So scared of the idea.
As I grew up, this tendency to get all morbid kind of faded. The business of life is thankfully distracting. Plus, I grew in to my spirituality so knowing that, even though my body dies…my energy still has to exist somehow, some way, is a comforting thought. Outwitting the Devil, by Napoleon Hill, helped me. So did The Untethered Soul. Both solid books that can give you an alternated look at life, death, and good and evil.
These books helped me slowly chip away at the fear.
A few months ago, I found myself lying awake again, thinking about death. I wasn’t so much afraid of dying because the thought of my impermanence was scary. More so, I was sad and full of worry for my children. I felt heartsick knowing that someday they are going to have to live their lives without me in it. Knowing that my death will probably be one of the biggests hurts they will face. I desperately don’t want them to have to face that kind of sadness and loss…but it’s inevitable.
Eventually that night, I was able to fall asleep. The panic attack finally faded. I had to talk myself out of the fear, and hang my heart on the fact that I’m not my body. My body is just holding me inside it right now. When my body goes, I will still be here for them somehow. In what way, I didn’t know.
Then, a couple weeks ago I started listening to The Art of Living. I’ve been downloading books on Audible to listen to when I go on my morning walks with Evie and I came across this one. The Art of Living is a deeply spiritual book, written by a monk who’s name I cannot pronounce for the life of me. The book is deep, but it’s not so deep that you can’t understand it. Of course, now I want to be a Buddhist and move to New Zealand or something and just spend my days enjoying nature.
Anyways, one part in the book really struck a chord with me. The monk writes about the many bodies we have, not just the physical body, but many others. He says that we think of ourselves like a wave in the ocean. The wave has a beginning and an end. When the wave is cresting, it thinks “this is it. Once I crash, I dissolve and I am done.” The cresting and the crashing are the beginning and the end. Just like we are born and someday will die.
But, in reality, the wave isn’t just the wave. The wave is part of the ocean. The wave isn’t a wave, really. That’s not what it’s made of. The wave is really water. Just like the ocean is water. This relationship between the wave and the ocean is the same thing as us humans and our physical bodies. Our physical body is the wave. When this physical body crashes down and dissolves, we aren’t done. We don’t disappear into nothingness. We become one again with the ocean and with the water. Because that’s what we are, really. Water…not a wave.
Listening to that as I walked outside with the blue sky above me, I felt so at peace. How beautiful is that thought? That this body is just a wave. A wave that has a journey, but not a beginning and an end. Sure, I have no idea what the ocean really is in respects to our lives. What we will dissolve in to once our physical bodies no longer exist and our own wave crashes down.
Maybe a collection of energies? Something bigger and greater and connected? I don’t know for sure. I will find out someday.
I’m writing this to share in case any of you out there also get paralyzed sometimes with the fear of death. Just know, that you are really the water, not the wave. You have no end.
Please read the book. I think it will give you some peace if you go into it with an open mind.
I am also writing this for my girls. I tried to talk to them about it. To share what I learned. But their attention spans are so damn short. I think I need to make up a dance and put my thoughts on TikTok for them to give me more than 1 minute of their minds.
They aren’t reading this blog now…but someday they will. And I hope, when that time comes and my time has come, that this post gives them some peace.
My little ladies, in the future, when my physical body no longer exists, I want you to know that I am not gone. I am still here for you. My energy will always be around you, as long as you remember me. Keep your heads up and live your lives with love and positivity.
We will be together again someday, when we all become part of the ocean again.
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Wow this was a really good read Krissy, love it!!!!❤
This is great read and sad too love u ❤️?