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Published: August 04, 2022
My apologies for the morbid topic but this is something that has been on my mind for a long time and is something I've also written personal journal entries on. These are my personal thoughts and feelings on the topic and are not an attempt to convince, you the reader, that you should believe the same. Death is a very personal topic that is individual to each of us but is something we should all reflect on to allow us to better our limited time in this life.
I guess let me first start with my thoughts on the after life and what happens after a person dies. I believe that when death comes we fade into nothingness. There is no heaven, there is no hell, our life simply comes to an end. I find comfort in that, if there is a heaven, I don't want to go and I've already experienced hell in this life so death does not scare me. The concept of heaven and hell are constructs of control to keep the masses in a prison that they are unaware of being in. That being said, were I wrong and heaven existed after death, and if I were put on trial in God's throne room I wouldn't even allow my sins to be pardoned even if I was "saved" by Christ. I would cast my soul into the abyss to be destroyed in such a manner that it would cease to exist, no hell just cessation of existence. Forever erased from the Lamb's Book of Life and wiped from existence. What greater punishment for "sin" could there be than that? The cessation of existence is what brings me comfort in death. The idea of there being a heaven where everyone who believed arrives to at the end of their life to live in a paradise worshiping a deity for all eternity doesn't sound appealing, it itself sounds like hell.
Most people desire to have their friends and family close by on their deathbed, I do not. I wish to die alone, preferably at home in my own bed while I'm asleep. There is a song called "oh, Lord" by NF (Nate Feuerstein) and it has a series of lyrics that resonate with me and would be my preference for what happens to this body after my death.
"When I die, put my ashes in the trash bag I don't care where they go. Don't waste your money on my gravestone."
I would not desire there to be a funeral or any service. I would want to be cremated and placed in a trash bag or a small cardboard box to be discarded away or tossed into the wind. There would be no grave to visit and no stone to mark such a grave. If people understood how quickly life moves on without them they would stop trying to impress the living. I would like to live my life as minimally as possible so that when death comes there is nothing left on this earth that needs to be dispersed or divided up. I simply leave this earth with nothing, the same as I came into it, which brings my desire to have a library in my tiny house into question every so often but in this mindset I am kept free from the confines of consumerism.
"Why should I fear death?
If I am, then death is not.
If Death is, then I am not.
Why should I fear that which can only exist when I do not?" - Epicurus