As an atheist, how do you handle the thought of death?
I used to be quite anxious about it, even more so because I tried to imagine what death would "feel" like if there was nothing after it in a thought experiment when I was about 15 years old, but with time I've slowly started to accept the inevitability of death and let go of my fear.
@Liberal50 I just don't die for long enough, nearly chronically sleep deprived because I keep waking up too early.
I have a death sentence hanging over me anyway. An incurable, but very slow acting cancer of my immune system. But I'm 76, I have narrowly escaped death very many times in my life, and I know I have to die sometime. But I will procrastinate for as long as possible, I can assure you.
Here's a link to my self written epitaph:-
[mojacar.ws]
Good poem...I like the statements at the end...."it's the last event my body will attend...." LOL
Yes, please procrastinate on that Petter, so you'll be able to hang around on this site for years to come. Hoping for the best outcome for you.
@SpikeTalon Thank you Spike.
I forget the quote and who said it mark Twain I think someone correct me if I'm wrong but it states " I was dead before I was born and it didn't bother me then so I'm not bothered by the thought of death" or something along those lines. Like I said I really don't remember it exactly.
That's a wise quote. I believe death is the same as before we were born - which is nothing.
I don't have to handle thoughts of death its inevitable like taxes & I wouldnt waste my precious time thinking about my own death it will come when it comes not scared ,only of pain.
There is a wonderful epitaph on the tomb in our local cemetery. It reads "He managed to avoid one of life's certainties."
Thank goodness for death. Like most people I enjoy my life, I am in no hurry to die, and in fact I take steps to try for a long life. But the scariest thing to consider would be enternal life. At some point I would have seen and done everything so many times that surely boredom would lead to madness. And knowing that release from it would NEVER be coming would indeed be hell. So I am grateful for the wondrous gift of life, and also grateful for an eventual end to it. As usual, I am peaceful and happy following the ways of nature.
Jean-Paul Sartre wisely said that death is one experience we don't have to live through. I find that quite comforting.
Well, I’m Agnostic, not an atheist.
But I am at peace with death. And the reason behind that is because it’s going to happen. Period. We are all going to die. And once you accept that, death isn’t all that scary. It’s the end of life. Everything ends sooner or later.
Agnostic and atheist are not mutually exclusive. One is an adjective the other is a noun. Most honest atheists will claim to be both. There are plenty of words out there, so please don't perpetuate the fallacy that agnostic is a belief system or lack thereof.
I was thinking about that (death) on my walk this morning. I was thinking that I probably need to get my things in order (wills and such). No, I'm not planning on dying anytime soon, but since I'm 53, alone, and really have no one here for support where I live, I think it's important to have your affairs in order. But I try not to think about it much, but if it happens, it happens. Much like birth.
I'm not afraid of death. I'm afraid of a painful, protracted, undignified lonely death.
And I keep coming back to this Tuck Everlasting quote:
"Do not fear death, but rather the unlived life. You don't have to live forever. You just have to live."
Good.
Very good question, most people need a comforting thought regarding death. I feel that is one of the driving reasons why these religious Charlatans have been able to exist for centuries. It offers comfort to the surviving loved ones too, to think that their loves ones are in a "better place." My thought is if I am dead, I am done. Provide me with proof i.e. a post card, a facebook, instagram or twitter post of your fun times in THE better place and perhaps I will change my mind.
When I was 14 my mother died of Ovarian Cancer, she was 45. I'm now 60. Sometime in the years after mom died I read an article that essentially said IF you knew you were going to die tomorrow, what would you do differently today? Having experienced death of the most important person in my life at that time, I knew how fast things could change. So, if I die tomorrow am I ready. Well, my kids need some passwords to handle my affairs efficiently, but they know how much I love them and we have a solid relationship. My job is going to go on without me just fine. Death is inevitable, it is coming sooner or later, and I'm about as ready as I can be. Yes, I need to get passwords and POAs for the kids, but I'm not going to lose sleep on that one. In the mean time, I have a life such as it is, and I will continue about the same as I was before.
The thought of death doesn't bother me anymore since I stopped believing in the religious endings to my story. I'm good knowing that my energy will return to the Universe and my ashes to Nature as should.
Not afraid of death. Will be unconscious. Plus before I was born, I can argue, I didn't exist and it wasn't a problem then.
Does anyone ever spend much time contemplating death? Even monotheists and monotheism don't dwell much on death, prefering to skip ahead to the life-ever-after bit.
I spent over two years in a bad place psychically and the prospect of a quick release was never too far from my thoughts - a rational response, given the circumstances. During that time, I came to the rational conclusion that, as I think I may have written in another post or comment, that death is, quite simply, the absence of life. I will cease to exist, other than in the memories of those who outlive me (as will the store of my memories, in the way that vivid dreams can be forgotten on waking as if they had never existed - and, to all intents and purposes, they don't). Death, then, is not some vast, dark nothingness, but an absence of everything - including me.
Death its self does not scare me. The ways I could be killed,now those do scare me as a young teen I was burned severely and the thought of being trapped in a burning car,or building freak me out.
I welcome human extinction, so I guess I’m pretty ok with it.
All life dies at some point. It is a part of life, it is inevitable. When my time comes I just don't want pain or machines. I don't fear it, I don't necessarily welcome it, but when it comes it comes.
I don't worry about it. In fact, sometimes I look forward to it.