Today is my birthday… But all I’ve been thinking about is death!
For a few years, I’ve been thinking how I’m going to die…
I am curious what my last day might look like…Will I have a diagnosis of a terminal disease, receiving an ultimatum, allowing me to prepare everything at my pace and say goodbye to everyone before I peacefully disappear?
Or will it be an abrupt event like a car crash, bidding farewell before even understanding what has just happened?
Believe it or not…
Thinking about my death has truly helped me look at my life from a different angle and paved the way for me to live my life without much resistance.
The first person who led me to contemplate death in depth was none other than Steve Jobs.
At the beginning of my entrepreneurial journey in 2017, I used to listen to and watch a lot of motivational videos, and I happened to watch Steve Jobs’ speech at Stanford University.
In his famous speech, he talked about three stories and one of them was about ‘Death’.
His speech caught my interest due to its depth and the impact it made on me…
I have a genuine passion for quotes and I’ve always been fascinated by the depth of the messages that such small sentences can convey, probably greater than can be communicated in a 1000 page book!
in his speech he said….
“If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.”
When I heard that, I could feel something in my gut, and ever since, from time to time, I’ve asked myself, “Is today going to be my last day?”
Not many would believe this…
My outlook on life, aspirations, the way I love and interact, and so many other things have changed over the last six years, and his speech was the beginning of my transition!
Yes, it was not easy…
There are times when I randomly select a day and make a promise that
“Ok, I’m going to pretend that I will die tomorrow, so how am I going to spend today?”
Guess what? It doesn’t last long!
Before I fulfil that promise to myself, I get deviated, and find myself submerged in the illusions of our daily life worries and small happiness, living as if I am going to live forever….!
However, things have changed for the better over the last two years.
Two of my start-ups didn’t yield the intended outcomes, which put me in a lot of difficulties.
This led to a lot of stress
And, I found rescue in daily meditation under the guidance of someone who is on his path to self-realisation!
Practicing meditation and my further research into karma opened the door to spirituality and I ended up believing in reincarnation, which gave me some exciting and interesting perspectives about death and how I see it….
Again, I find that despite all these discussions, deep down in my heart, I know I don’t want to die because I’m scared of how it’s going to happen and I’m scared of that uncertainty.
An interesting thing I heard from someone I consider as my spiritual guide [whom I’ve never met in person] was:
“Do you remember when you were born? It is indeed a complex process but here you are…and you don’t recall any of it now. Just like that, moving on from this life is complicated, but don’t worry. It will unfold just the way it’s meant to.”
What have I realised so far?
It’s not the actual death or the worries of lack of oxygen that we are really worried about. We are worried that we have to leave this beautiful world and our loved ones.
Since I read about those five people who are stuck somewhere deep in the sea, knowing that they are going to die if not rescued, I’ve been trying to put myself in their shoes and thinking about how I would spend the last few hours of my life…
Would I be happy and ready to accept the fact and be prepared to say goodbye, or would there be any resistance?
The more I try to put myself in their situation, I feel myself becoming breathless and taking deep breaths. A lot of emotions are going through me!
June 22 is my birthday!
I was at work doing night shift when I started writing this blog because I knew I needed to write about what I felt to make myself feel better…
As I’m writing this, I have received a video message from my beautiful wife and son wishing me a Happy Birthday!
I just couldn’t control my tears and started thinking about those who are trapped down there!
The emotions they must be going through right now and how much they must miss their loved ones. I also read news about around 30 people killed in a blast in France but it did not evoke any of the feelings that I have about those who are missing on their adventure to see the submerged wreck of Titanic.
I know it’s all about life…
But the difference I see is the sudden change in the course of their life and how they are inevitably walking towards it.
Now it’s 10:52 BST and I read they only had enough oxygen until around 11 o’ clock in the morning.
I’ve refreshed the news so many times but it doesn’t seem to be happening…
I don’t have much hope for them coming back and they are probably on their way to their final destination.
As Steve Jobs said, “Death is the final destination we all share.”
For them, it might be today, which also happens to be my birthday.
And this day has led me to contemplate death more than any other time recently.
Safe journey, folks. I hope all your loved ones have the strength to bear this difficult time.
