when we stop worrying about death is when we start living, being obsessed with death while living makes no sense unless u like headaches, just hearing this guy talk gave me one.
I disagree with Solomon and Becker on this point, as far as it is presented here. We can articulate what we fear about death, and it seems painfully clear to me what the issue is. It seems, according to everything I have ever read and experienced on the subject, that we fear death because we fear annihilation, nothingness, oblivion. Perhaps less conscious animals fear death on an instinctual level, as Solomon appears to be saying, but this really does not seem to be the case for humans.
@squamish4244 Hi. Someone (perhaps even you) said this in an iTunes review of Flight from Death. I wanted to ask if that is really at odds with what they're saying (& how so). Please clarify.
@ProstheticHymns Hello, no I did not write that review, but perhaps that person had a background in Buddhism, as I do. According to Buddhism, we construct an identity for ourselves out of concepts - mental conditioning, habits, memories, thoughts of the future, physical appearance, etc. and take that identity to be 'me'. Death threatens to destroy that identity and therefore we become terrified.
@ProstheticHymns So the fear of death that appears instinctual can, upon examination, be deconstructed into what I have explained. It also means we have a method for overcoming that fear, for Buddhism (and other traditions) says that by releasing our grasping onto the various components of this mental construct, our true nature, of an infinite transcendent consciousness, is revealed to us.
@squamish4244 Thanks, that's interesting. So, are you saying that the transcendental consciousness is (in some sense) more instinctual or primordial than "the fear of death that appears instinctual?" I'd ask whether inclinations to construct & clutch the identity you mention are instinctual, but I'm not sure what that would establish for now. I did wonder whether "releasing one's grasp" presents the same fears as death, since both sound like they annihilate the self. Thoughts?
@ProstheticHymns Speaking from experience, when I was directly confronted with the insubstantiality of my own identity, the result was a terror of death and annihilation. Since then, years ago now, I have endured many panic attacks and an overall level of very high anxiety that I have only brought under control through releasing my grasp on the identity that I had taken to be myself (the inclination to form this identity is probably unconscious or instinctual 90% of the time).
@ProstheticHymns How did I do this, and bring the anxiety down to a level where I can foresee a future without it, however distant that may be? In addition to the help of several highly skilled healers, I applied the ancient Buddhist practice of mindfulness to use the power of awareness - of observation - to the anxiety and terror and other emotions that arose, and the emotions diminished in strength under that power.
@ProstheticHymns I would argue, and Buddhist and mystical traditions of many cultures worldwide concur, that this awareness, not identified with any 'thing' but infinite and all-encompassing, is indeed the primordial condition of all humans, always present, and merely obscured by the web of grasping that makes us fear death. For people who have attained a highly aware or 'enlightened' state, death is meaningless, because they are no longer clinging to this identity, this form.
he's gnarly. i dig how he talks and how he words his statements.
2004dale 1 month ago
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when we stop worrying about death is when we start living, being obsessed with death while living makes no sense unless u like headaches, just hearing this guy talk gave me one.
fhab525 2 months ago
Comment removed
fhab525 2 months ago
I disagree with Solomon and Becker on this point, as far as it is presented here. We can articulate what we fear about death, and it seems painfully clear to me what the issue is. It seems, according to everything I have ever read and experienced on the subject, that we fear death because we fear annihilation, nothingness, oblivion. Perhaps less conscious animals fear death on an instinctual level, as Solomon appears to be saying, but this really does not seem to be the case for humans.
squamish4244 4 months ago
@squamish4244 Hi. Someone (perhaps even you) said this in an iTunes review of Flight from Death. I wanted to ask if that is really at odds with what they're saying (& how so). Please clarify.
ProstheticHymns 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns Hello, no I did not write that review, but perhaps that person had a background in Buddhism, as I do. According to Buddhism, we construct an identity for ourselves out of concepts - mental conditioning, habits, memories, thoughts of the future, physical appearance, etc. and take that identity to be 'me'. Death threatens to destroy that identity and therefore we become terrified.
squamish4244 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns So the fear of death that appears instinctual can, upon examination, be deconstructed into what I have explained. It also means we have a method for overcoming that fear, for Buddhism (and other traditions) says that by releasing our grasping onto the various components of this mental construct, our true nature, of an infinite transcendent consciousness, is revealed to us.
squamish4244 2 months ago
@squamish4244 Thanks, that's interesting. So, are you saying that the transcendental consciousness is (in some sense) more instinctual or primordial than "the fear of death that appears instinctual?" I'd ask whether inclinations to construct & clutch the identity you mention are instinctual, but I'm not sure what that would establish for now. I did wonder whether "releasing one's grasp" presents the same fears as death, since both sound like they annihilate the self. Thoughts?
ProstheticHymns 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns Speaking from experience, when I was directly confronted with the insubstantiality of my own identity, the result was a terror of death and annihilation. Since then, years ago now, I have endured many panic attacks and an overall level of very high anxiety that I have only brought under control through releasing my grasp on the identity that I had taken to be myself (the inclination to form this identity is probably unconscious or instinctual 90% of the time).
squamish4244 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns How did I do this, and bring the anxiety down to a level where I can foresee a future without it, however distant that may be? In addition to the help of several highly skilled healers, I applied the ancient Buddhist practice of mindfulness to use the power of awareness - of observation - to the anxiety and terror and other emotions that arose, and the emotions diminished in strength under that power.
squamish4244 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns I would argue, and Buddhist and mystical traditions of many cultures worldwide concur, that this awareness, not identified with any 'thing' but infinite and all-encompassing, is indeed the primordial condition of all humans, always present, and merely obscured by the web of grasping that makes us fear death. For people who have attained a highly aware or 'enlightened' state, death is meaningless, because they are no longer clinging to this identity, this form.
squamish4244 2 months ago
@ProstheticHymns Adyashanti is one teacher who has numerous videos on here and expresses these concepts very well.
squamish4244 2 months ago
@squamish4244 Thank you. I'll check him out.
ProstheticHymns 2 months ago
Comment removed
squamish4244 2 months ago