Life and Death: Part I
Death: A Part of Our Everyday Lived Experience
When we think of death, we are referring to the end of someone’s physical presence on earth. But as we all know and have experienced, that is certainly not the end of the influence they have on our lives. Their presence carries on a non-physical life within each of us. The memory of them, the guidance they gave us during their life adheres itself to our being. This is how we are able to carry on their memory, their legacy. More importantly, how we are able to move forward with a greater sense of purpose, to live.
The Death of Self
There are a multitude of behavioral deaths that occur each and every day. Those deaths do not entail the loss of someone in a physical sense, but the loss of a particular part of one’s life, a behavior, for example. Such as a part of the person we pretended to be before a significant event changed our way of navigating the world.
We often engage in behaviors that keep us from living fully and true to ourselves because of deeply felt cultural and/or familial expectations. When realizing these shifts a slow or, in some instances, a quick death of self begins to take place.
Maybe it is the death of a behavior that began in our childhood that continues to define us. The one that sticks like…
