A note

Time in our life...

A friend's grandmother-in-law is now residing in hospice.  It must have been hard for her to go through this during final times.  I think about the people who have to go through this daily and wonder how life must have been for them.  I often reflect on death and think about it as a progress or I must say a step I need to cross someday.  Too early for a young person to think about death one may say, but it can come so unexpectedly that I feel there is a need for preparation.  You might wonder... what kind of preparation?  funeral? burial? ceremony? Actually, these things are not important.  I wonder whether a dead person can appreciate the elaborate ceremony and feel important because of it.  I wonder whether a dead person can see the nicely built tomb where his body will lay resting.  I wonder about what their final thoughts on life would be...

For me, death is very simple.  It's the end and also the beginning.  The end of a lifetime, and the beginning of another lifetime. It marks the transitional period between this life and the next life.  The past should not be a matter of interest because the effects have been done.  The future should not be a matter of interest because who knows what lies ahead.  As a Buddhist saying, you can only live at the present... you can't live in the past, neither can you live in the future.  Treating the last moment of your life as it is might be the best way to confront reality.  It might relieve the difficult past that you don't want to remember.  It might relieve the anxiety that you have for the future.  We tend to cling to our past be it happy or sad to make our departure difficult.  We tend to cling to the unfinished business that we want to accomplish.  But learning how to let it go... learning how to look at things as it is nature... be it a new birth or a final farewell...things come and go.

I can't talk to you... neither will our religion coincide.  I can't tell what you let go the past and stop thinking about the future.  Neither can I tell you to be as you are.  I only wish if tonight is your last night, may you rest in peace and may you find happiness in wherever you may be.

Farewell to the person whom I've never met...