Pain of death

Hello. How are you all? Hope all are fine. Just sharing some thoughts about the pain through which all of us are going. In these days, we are always confronting death. Many of us have lost their dear ones. Many of us have endured tremendous pain. Generally we are never taught to see death with open eyes. Mostly from childhood, we are kept away from death. Even the crematorium is outside the town and this topic never comes in our discussion.

But if we open our eyes, we see that death is permanent. Rather, there is nothing more confirmed in our life than death. Money, prestige, peace, satisfaction, we may get it or we may not. Nothing can be said about it. But death is confirmed. Here no one has a waiting or RAC ticket. Everyone has a confirmed ticket. Today is Buddha Purnima. Tathagat Buddha would tell his Bhikshus to meditate in the crematorium. He would send them there for two months and would tell them to observe death, observe the burning body being destroyed. Watch it consciously so that you understand that one day your body too will be destroyed like this.

When our dear one dies, then in a sense we also die. Because we are his part or he was our part. Therefore a vacuum comes and an emptiness comes. If we can watch death consciously, then we see our own death there. The society had taught us to refrain from watching death. Therefore we cannot see it with open eyes. But if we show a little courage and watch it, then we start seeing our own death in all deaths happening around us. Then we understand the truth that yes, here everyone’s death is confirmed. And when we start seeing death of another person as our own death, as a reminder of our coming death, then slowly the pain of the death starts to wane. From inside we feel that it is a confirmed thing, there is no point in rejecting it. And when we accept death, new dimensions of life gets opened for us. Then when we see a fragile bodied patient or a very vulnerable patient, then we know from within that this is my future. Today it is his reality, tomorrow it will be my reality.

If we constantly remain conscious about death, then meaning of life gets changed. There is pain, there is a reason for the pain, the pain can be overcome and there is also a state of being where no pain remains, was the message of Buddha and then we can go towards this path of meditation. In another words, as the famous Hindi song goes-

मै पल दो पल का शायर हूँ
पल दो पल मेरी कहानी है
पल दो पल मेरी हस्ती है
पल दो पल मेरी जवानी है

(Length of life is just two seconds).

If we internalize this consciousness, then slowly our journey starts towards the path of Nirvana as told by Buddha. And when a person achieves truth of Nirvana beyond death, then he or she can say-

मै हर एक पल का शायर हूँ
हर एक पल मेरी कहानी है
हर एक पल मेरी हस्ती है
हर एक पल मेरी जवानी है

(Length of THIS life is permanent.)

Best wishes to all of you for your journey on this path.

(To read this article in Hindi and to read my other articles about meditation: www.niranjan-vichar.blogspot.com niranjanwelankar@gmail.com Niranjan Welankar 09422108376)