EPTI'd be less afraid of death if I thought Hell existed and that I was going there.
Why are you afraid to die? - Page 7
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MTF
United States1739 Posts
I'd be less afraid of death if I thought Hell existed and that I was going there. | ||
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OverTheUnder
United States2929 Posts
On January 13 2007 02:40 mlaoxve wrote: ir not afraid of death, just certain ways to die LIKE MURDER STAB IN THE FACE well said my friend, well said. | ||
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jjun212
Canada2208 Posts
but with God im not afraid.. and yes.. i do believe in God (_ _) | ||
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smfd
United States423 Posts
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doedrikthe2nd
Sweden981 Posts
On January 13 2007 14:32 jjun212 wrote: without God... because of what happens afterwards... the nothingness... that life will go on and you are... nothing but with God im not afraid.. and yes.. i do believe in God (_ _) Congratulaions! | ||
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CoralReefer
Canada2069 Posts
the point i was trying to make was that the very reason we feel pain, is because we have evolved to select against injuring or killing ourselves. i look at "fear" as being a mechanism to avoid certain situations. i think of "fear of death" as a survival mechanism, so this is why i sub categorized those other types of fear. some examples which don't involve pain: fear of drowning, fear of suffocation, claustrophobia... these are all situations that can kill us | ||
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CoralReefer
Canada2069 Posts
On January 13 2007 02:40 mlaoxve wrote: ir not afraid of death, just certain ways to die LIKE MURDER STAB IN THE FACE i'm not afraid of any animals, i'm just afraid of bears | ||
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red.venom
United States4651 Posts
But I dont believe in heaven or hell, so in my mind when im gone thats it. I will just cease to be and the world will go on. | ||
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Mora
Canada5235 Posts
On January 12 2007 18:07 MTF wrote: Although I don't always see eye to eye with you (this would be one of those cases), you're always showing yourself to be one of the more thought-out and self-explored members of this site. I'm only really replying to this though, because my fiance and I had a long talk on death recently, and her views pretty much match yours. :p I would like you to further explain your views, if you're willing, particularly on why the ending of ones life is the magnifying point. Not as in how, because I understand that it's like the end of anything, it's closure and finality to say "this is what this was". But, why that closure has so much meaning to you, personally. If you don't mind. Mostly wanting to compare answers and further expand my own understanding. Ok, i have spent the past 3 hours articulating my response. It is very long, but my explanation of my perspectives cannot really be explained with less. I hope you have the patience to read what i have to say, and that if you do, that it will not be a waste of your time. My pre-emptive apologies if it turns out to be so. ----------- It started when i was 10 years old. My parents, while believeing in an after life, did not have any sort of faith. They never really passed their beliefs along since they didn't really know what they believed in themselves. So, while lying in bed on some insignificant day in March of that year, i was for some random reason thinking what it would be like to be dead - and my realization crippled me. It occured that i would not think, feel, or be me. It caused a terrible anxiety in me. I could not function unless i would escape into Final Fantasy 3, my RPG of choice during that period of my life. My parents, baffled by and distraught at my turmoil tried to aid me in finding some answers that could be of comfort to me. My dad gave me a bible, and as well "A Book of Bible Stories" for a bit of an easier (and less grotesque) read. And my mom at this time was exploring her own spiritually, by which she had come across Sylve Browne - reknown pyschic and explorer of the spiritual realm. My mom gave me 'Adventures of a Pyschic', Sylvia Brownes first book about the paranormal. At that age, the things Sylvia Browne elaborated on were fantastical and inspiring. I was so paralyzed by fear; i would and did cling to anything that could make some semblance of sense in order to quash my distress. Her ideas that God loves us, there is no Hell, that we write our lives before we live them (called 'blueprints', or 'charts'), and that we live many many lives, as Earth is much like 'school' for our souls - these were comforting. I was an avid fan of hers up until i was 16 years old or so. And, ironically, it was through her own writing that doubts started to stir about what she had to say. I was reading 'God, Creation, and the Universe' within where she said some extraordinary things. No longer was life about only about living through our choreographed trials, joys, and accomplishments, but that also and more-so, all our 'ideas' exist on another plane of reality. Gnomes, Pixies, Leprechauns - these are all very much real; there is no longer just one God, but two: a Mother and Father God; there are not just Spirit Guides (people on the Other Side who help guide us through our lives) but also Totems (spirit guide animals), gaurdian angels and lesser angels, and a legion of other 'entities' to help us along our path (such as the Goddess of the Night, i forget her name). These things were quite interesting to read, but they turned life so much into a fantasy that i couldn't help but start to view her books as nothing more than just that - an intricate, powerful, but completely fictional fantasy. Despite my depreciation of her ideas, it never occurred to me to start to re-inquire about the fears that had debilitated my existance a 3rd of my life ago. And then i was 19 years old, Mid-November, when my best friend and two others decided it would be a delightful idea to consume some Mushrooms. This was the true beginning into my very real plunge into the depths of what death 'is'. I don't know much about others' experience with shrooms, but of all the times i've done them (about 8?) i've never had a hallucination. I have done moderate to large doses everytime, and i've experienced auditory hallucinations, but never a visual. So typically i just escape to the recesses of my mind, catapluting myself into philosophical and pyschological voyages. This one was different from my others in that it sent me into a 4 month depression; or more so, Despair. This part is very hard to describe. Anyone who has not experienced drugs will have no idea what it's like, and will not understand that any horror you can feel while sober is immensely dwarfed by the depth of it when you are not. Anyone who has experience with drugs will no better be able to know what i felt, other than knowing what i felt was immense, as my trip has not been any of theirs. ... I could hear myself thinking. I'm not talking about thoughts we 'hear' in our heads, i'm talking about the space between. When a person attempts to 'not think' they are (most likely) unable to do so. I was not trying to not-think, however, i was thinking about what it is to think. What is happening inside us that allows us to 'hear' our thoughts? And it was between these thoughts that i started to recognize an echo, or more, a silent gap. I could 'hear' that gap; I could hear the silence. My thoughts were no longer fluid. I would be aware and i would be thinking, and in the next moment i would simply be aware without any thinking at all. At first i found this sensation extremely intriguing, i let it dance with me for a significant amount of time. But then, for some forsaken reason, i present to myself: "Now what would it be like to neither think nor be aware?" I was filled with a very brief moment - less than a moment - of fear when my gut realized where this train of thought was going to take me. However, i ignored such a thing, and tried to catapult myself into a place where i was not thinking nor feeling. I proceded to close my eyes. I 'shut off' my ears to a point where i could not hear anything. I stopped breathing; stopped feeling the sensation of air filling my lungs. I turned off 'thought' as i had been successfully experimenting with previously. I do not know how long this lasted. I do not know if i was able to truly 'turn off' anything in my body - it may have just been a crazy drug induced slowing-of of perception (or speeding-up-of, depending on how you look at it). I cannot judge the amount of time that passed in these moments, but only know i 'awoke'. My thought-silentness was not broken or shattered, for unlike the previous thought-less awareness, there was no silence to break. There was simply a gap in my existence. Time had passed when my senses and awareness had not given their permission to do so. And within instants, the realization came crushing home that that was what death was. My eyes shot open, my heart tried to bust out of my body. I wanted to scream, and to cry, and to claw myself out of my skin. But i was paralyzed. I sat there staring out of a window that was across from me. After 10-30 minutes i decided that i couldn't bare to be in the company of my friends, and so left without a word and laid down in my bed. I cannot accurately describe what i was like at this time. I could not stop moving. I wanted to cry more than anything else in the world - i wanted to feel something. But no tears were forthright. I was not physically paralyzed, but mentally i was debilitated. I could not stop rehearsing the moment after i had 'ceased' to exist; the 'waking up' or 'coming back' that it was. I could not sleep for hours. The horror i felt is unparalleled to anything i have ever experienced in my existence. Over the next month my day consisted of me waking up, moving aimlessly throughout my house. I'd lie in my bed, i'd lie on the couch. I ate little. I did not leave my house. I was too scared/lost/crippled to watch TV, read, or play video games, i had no desire to play Starcraft despite my addiction. I had no desire to talk to anyone but my mother; and my attempts to do so only scared her. She would answer the phone and i would say Hello. I would be silent for the most part. She would ask me what is wrong; i would hesitate (for my lack of ability to articulate such an experience) and whisper to her that i was afraid; she would inquire why and of what - i would respond simply that it was impossible to explain. I worried her immensely. My feelings ranged from horror, despair, loneliness, and insignificance. These would circulate for the 12 hours a day or less that i was awake, as i'd try to spend as much time sleeping as i possibly could. Exhaustion. I will not claim what it's like to be someone in a truly horrifying circumstance - such as war, torture, or dying from a malady like cancer - but i do know exactly how exhausting a circumstance can make you. I was spiritually and mentally exhausted. And after 2 months or so, i started to get sick of it (more like boreom, but a very disgusted boredom). At this point i was able to cry, and did so daily. I was able to watch spurts of TV until something tragic happened on screen - such as seeing an animal pass away, or even the glimpse of someone of old age - someone moving ever closer to the oblivion that is death. I started to read a little bit here and there. I started to shower more than once a week; i started to eat at least once every day, as opposed to the typical 3-4 days without food. I started to interact with my friends a bit, but they would scare me very easily and i would retreat to my loneliness. Ironically - and most fortunately - i started to read Anne Rices 'Vampire Chronicles' upon suggestion from my boyfriend (ironic because vampires are immortal). I was infatuated with the idea of immortality, that our life and our existence does not have to disappear, does not have to lose its insignificance, that a world - even a fictional one! - existed where people do not have to Die. I was able to absorb myself in "Interview with the Vampire" from noon until morning, absorbing the words in a way that i had never read words before. And that is probably the moment i would pinpoint that things in my life started to Change. I was reading a beautiful fantasy novel, filled with beautiful creatures and fantastical ideas, and i looked out of my window to see one of the most beautiful sunrises i've ever seen in my life. A mirage of yellows and oranges cascaded into the fleeting blue of the darkness. And that's the first time it hit me. These things, My Life, the act of Experiencing, is Beautiful. Despite all the truth and despair and horror that reality is, there is still beauty. - That "Life in a Glass House" is a beautiful song! - That mothers with unconditional love look down on their children in their arms, and are beautiful - That two individuals sharing intimacy is profound and beautiful - That the reds, golds, purples that can be found in the blooms of flowers, and the seasons that turn the leaves on trees those same colours, are beautiful! And all these things exist in spite of their insignificance! Things are not beautiful because they are forever, they are beautiful because they are not!. Since then, my life has never been a bad one. Even in struggling moments i have an immense and profound respect for life. I have an even more profoud and respect for Tragedy because tragedy only adds to our beauty. Life is harsh, and brutal, and savage. There is no justice, there is no forgivness, there is no inherant right or wrong. We amble along through life not knowing - often searching - for answers, and the truth is there are none. And how can all of this not be beautiful? How can all this feeling, and joy, and pain, and sorrow, and love, not be beautiful beyond imagining! When you watch someone lose a loved one - a child, lover, or parent - and they are utterly torn apart how can that obvious and declaration of love for that lost individual not inspire an insane respect for beauty? That such emotions are possible that losing them causes such rivals in emotion? When we die, all of this ends. We no longer suffer tragedy, we no longer love, or be but admirers in the garden of Beauty. We lose our Awareness. It is not that this finality of it all that gives our life meaning, it's that our life was meaningful inspite of this finality. I'm in love with that finality because it's all apart of it. Beauty can't be what it is without it, and is all the more beautiful for it. ... I hope someone can get something out of this. It is My Life. | ||
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Pseudo_Utopia
Canada827 Posts
On January 13 2007 00:24 ~AreS] wrote: Since everything that we are is created by impulses in the brain, it's safe to assume no impulse = no consciousness. Worst case scenario you end up retarded, at which point you don't give a damn. Then tell me this: are you able to imagine a state in which no consciousness is experienced? The answer, of course, is no, since we are only able to imagine actual states, not "non-states" or absence of state. So if I follow your reasoning, there is still no way to give any substance or reality to my imagination of my own death. Basically, I know that after I'm dead, I won't be experiencing or being "X", where X can be replaced by anything you can name. However, there is no way to make a positive statement (not positive in the sense of good but positive in the sense of stating that something is a certain way) about my own personal death and I find myself unable to be afraid of something I have absolutely no way to define. I am not afraid of nothingness because there is nothing in it to cause that fear. Of course, I'm afraid of many things that could lead to death, such as a hardcore multiple stabbing in the face as was mentioned. But that's another story. | ||
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Spike
United States1392 Posts
Life will always go on; get used to it. | ||
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MTF
United States1739 Posts
I can process what you said and appreciate, am happy that such thoughts can bring you resolution. A lot of your thoughts I have heard from my fiance before, spelled in different ways with the same meaning, though of similar depth and self-awareness. They're wonderful insights, especially when I hear it from two sources, but they don't strike that same chord for me. I wish they did. XP Thank you, again, for being so open and willing. Taking the time. I'm glad you found your peace. | ||
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ROOTheognis
United States4482 Posts
i need to do shrooms now damnit! | ||
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brian
United States9583 Posts
i've never gone through days of depression about the fact, but i've had really deep and disturbing experiences with my revelations about my life and the fact that my death isnt avoidable in the end, ive come to almost the same conclusion and thoughts myself. Back in the day when i was an angsty pre-teen/early teens i was "suicidal" to the point where i had tried, failed due to lack of effort and deep down not enough desire to carry it out. that only sent me into further bouts of tears and depression. everyone in my life had left me, my dad, my girlfriend, it was rough(those are the important ones in the story). i wish i could say i had these great revelations back then, but no, i just had to bear out the stupid teenage depression and get the hell over it here i am years later, lets say i was 16, when i had again given lots of thought into death, and i drew the conclusions i have now. here i am at 18 with my present thoughts and feelings. looking back i wish i could just backhand myself for being so ridiculous. life is amazing, and there is NOTHING worth dying for. you could lose everything and life is still worth it to just keep breathing every day just to see the next. the fact that i have to die some time terrifies me, but no use worrying about it now because life is fuckin fantastic. | ||
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brian
United States9583 Posts
and much like MTF, i would be 10x less afraid of death if i knew i was going to hell. as long as i'd still have an existance. of course i wouldnt turn down heaven, but im not picky. | ||
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Mora
Canada5235 Posts
On January 13 2007 17:10 MTF wrote: Thank you for explaining. : ) I can process what you said and appreciate, am happy that such thoughts can bring you resolution. A lot of your thoughts I have heard from my fiance before, spelled in different ways with the same meaning, though of similar depth and self-awareness. They're wonderful insights, especially when I hear it from two sources, but they don't strike that same chord for me. I wish they did. XP Thank you, again, for being so open and willing. Taking the time. I'm glad you found your peace. I'd love to meet your girlfriend. Thank you for inspiring me to articulate my experiences. I've tried many times before without much success, and am happy that i was able to express what i did. And thank you for reading.  | ||
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L!MP
Australia2067 Posts
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Mora
Canada5235 Posts
On January 13 2007 17:10 YoiChiBow wrote: very well written and i love the ideas expressed in it. i need to do shrooms now damnit! Thanks! And while i completely appreciate my Shroom experience, i must say again that it was hard. If you're going to search inside yourself for answers, you need know that not all those answers are happy ones (thought i do believe that they are all good). I was able to conquer my demons on shrooms but i will never do LSD out of fear that i may not be able to conquer the demons found on that intense trip. | ||
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Cpt Obvious
Germany3073 Posts
On January 12 2007 23:38 CoralReefer wrote: so you are not dying when you are being killed? last time i did this, i received a 1 week temp ban, lets see what happens this time: ![[image loading]](http://img149.imageshack.us/img149/4109/peopledieiftheyarekillebf2.jpg) | ||
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CoralReefer
Canada2069 Posts
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