The following is based on an excerpt from the book There’s More to Dying than Death: A Buddhist Perspective by Lama Shenpen Hookham. Although written from a Buddhist view, there is much to be gleaned by others.

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Having written a whole book for others on the topic of death, my intention now is to use it to reflect on death again and again myself. Even though the theme of death is central to Buddhism, it is amazingly hard to keep it well in mind.

A Daily Reflection

Traditionally, a Buddhist teacher would give a student the practice of reflection on death as a preliminary before engaging in any other practice, such as meditation or study. From then on, the student would be expected to spend time reflecting on death every day of their life.

The Example of Great Practitioners

When you read the lives of the greatest practitioners, those who have succeeded in Awakening, it is clear that they reflected deeply on death, and that was what motivated them and enabled them successfully to traverse the path to Awakening.

This reflection provides both the vision and the impetus to overcome all difficulties, and to regard any difficulty on the path as nothing compared with the pain of remaining trapped in the unawakened state of samsara. [Samsara, a Sanskrit term, literally means “the turning”. It refers to the turning or wandering round and round in an interminable succession of lives characterized by suffering. It is existence as experienced by unenlightened beings, whether it’s the treadmill of living from day to day, going nowhere except into old age and death, or the suffering of being trapped in delusion from one life to the next.]

Reflecting on the Inevitability of Death

So I suggest from time to time setting aside five minutes to an hour to think about the inevitability of death.

Don’t think to yourself that you don’t have time for this; you can do it walking down the street. In fact, it is very effective to do it in a crowded street thinking about how every single one of the people you see is going to die.

Reflecting on the Unpredictability of Death

What is even more awful is that none of us knows when. Any one of those people, even we ourself, might be the next to go. When we hear about the danger of terrorism, we tend to feel very threatened and may think, ‘Oh, I don’t want to go to London or New York, or fly in an aircraft. I might get blown up.’ But terrorism only raises the probability of our dying today by a tiny fraction. We might die today anyway. There is absolutely no security.

So there is something poignant [evoking a keen sense of sadness or regret] about everyone getting upset about some particular disaster somewhere in the world; it is as if we are ignoring the fact that the whole of life is a disaster. We act as if just this one little bit of the whole thing is a disaster and how dreadful it is that people have to suffer that. But in fact we are all in the situation of not knowing which of us is going to have to suffer next and in what kind of way. Terrible and fatal illnesses strike young and old, rich and poor, high-fliers and society’s outcasts with equal disregard for status or person. As we try to focus on this, it is interesting how strongly we resist this way of thinking.

There is only any point to it if we have some kind of confidence that there is a path that leads to Awakening.

Becoming Aware of Our Denial

As we get older and see young people looking so happy and confident, so pleased with their looks and attractiveness, we remember the time of our own youth when we, like the young today, couldn’t really imagine becoming old. All the evidence was there, but we ignored it.

Of course, we all know intellectually that we are getting old and death is drawing nearer all the time, but we act as if death is far away. Very old people seem like a race apart.

Even as we grow old, we are constantly trying to tell ourselves we are not really that old. It is as though we are being taken on a train to a place of slaughter but we keep telling ourselves, ‘Oh no, I am just on a sight-seeing tour,’ refusing to think about where the train is going.

This is like the father of the Buddha-to-be trying to hide the true nature of life. The story goes that he hoped that if his son never thought about old age, sickness, or death, he would not give up worldly ambition. He wanted his son to seek worldly success and knew that if he saw what was really in store for everyone, he would lose all that ambition.

Danger of Getting Fully Caught Up in All of Life’s Activity

There is a strong side in all of us that is like that father, trying to persuade us things are really not all that bad. If we forget that it is going to the place of our death, it can be fun, in a narrow, limited way, to be on this train that is our life. It is so easy to forget all about the destination and just to enjoy the ride; or at least simply try to make the journey as comfortable as possible, instead of seriously thinking about getting off the train altogether.

Need for a Vision Beyond Death

To get off the train altogether would be to find the essence of pure enjoyment, but we do not see it that way. That is why it is necessary to reflect again and again on the fact that all worldly joy ends in suffering and death, and that the Buddha opened a way to the joy of Awakening that goes beyond all suffering, birth, and death. It is only by reflecting on this again and again, and by repeatedly reading the accounts of accomplished practitioners, that we realize that what is being said here is extremely relevant and important. You might even find reading this page again and again a good lead in to this kind of reflection.

It is important, as we reflect on the inevitability and unpredictability of our death, to also reflect on the lives of the Buddha and his followers down the ages, and what they discovered. We need to have some sense of the possibility of there being an alternative path for us, otherwise reflection on death is just depressing or could even induce a devil-may-care attitude. If we are all going to be dead soon, why not just grab as much pleasure as we can, while we can?

The Need to Often Reflect on the Reality of Death

Often the most accomplished practitioners have the message of death and suffering thrust on them by life’s circumstances while they are still young. From the Buddhist perspective this is a great blessing. It caused them to realize very early on that samsara holds no hope, and prepared them for their Dharma journey without misgivings. The rest of us have to reflect again and again to really bring home the message that death could happen any time and that it is coming nearer all the time. Otherwise, even though we see and hear of people’s deaths all the time, we still regard death as something that happens to other people, while our own continues to seem remote.

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Source: Based on Hookham, Lama Shenpen. There’s More to Dying than Death: A Buddhist Perspective. Cambridge, UK: Windhorse Publications, 2006. [Sub-headings added by website designer.]

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