Just do stuff
I experienced the death of my Uncle at close quarters recently. He was in a palliative care home and they called me one evening saying his pulse was erratic. When I went there with my family to see him, I did not know that he was in his last throes. He had the oxygen mask and his chest was heaving up and down, struggling to breathe. His eyes were shut. We tried to wake him up, but he would not. Another hour and he passed away. They had wrapped his body and he looked at peace and sleeping in the freezer.
All the moments I had with him as a child and later when I was in college and used to visit his house to have home food was what remained of him. The body was gone. The person whom I have been associating with that body was all gone. It was all real. I mean the non-reality. I have read, heard, even visually played in my mind about how unreal we all are. And here, I could witness it first hand. It was a great moment. No books could bring me to a halt than seeing it happening right in front of your eyes. No amount of understanding can bring the truth that the “I” I have nurtured all along will cease to exist one day.
Living becomes simple when you understand dying. It is not about being egoless or desire-free or holy or spiritual or evil. It is not about being in some way or the other. It is all about just being and doing what needs to be done. You want to read a book, go read it. You want to go hiking. Go do it. You want to make money. Go make it. You have a pain. Suffer it.
Nothing to complain, nothing to glorify. No losses or gains. It is a state to be in, where there is no colour given to anything.
You just do stuff. And nothing more. Silently.
