Afterlife

I had a family member die years ago in another part of the country. At what turned out to be the exact moment of her death (I learned later), I heard her voice talking to me as clear as if she was sitting right next to me.

Have no idea what that meant (or means). But it's a moment that's never left me because it seems so weird. So is there an afterlife? Beats me, but put me in the I hope so category.

 

Of course there's no way to prove it, but I have no doubt in my mind there is an afterlife.

No doubt whatsoever.

 

I think that heaven/nirvana/enlightenment (many paths, one mountain) ... is a state of mind, not a celestial place or an afterlife or anything that we can comprehend or replicate in human terms.

I think that state of mind can be reached (and we should strive to reach it) in this lifetime.

I cannot reconcile the idea that there is a "better place" but we have to wait until death to reach it -- that there is something "better" waiting for us upon death -- some kind of "payoff", whether it's that you get to be with God or have 72 virgins to yourself or lush golf courses all over the grounds. Those ideas are fun to imagine, but they're intellectually deceiving. ... If something is "better" in the afterlife, then the current life has to be "not better", which means you value the afterlife more than life, a kinder way of saying you value death more than life. I can't agree with that idea.

I think it paints a picture of life here as less meaningful, and gives us too much excuse for not living life fully in the now.

Heaven is a state of mind, and each of us has a different mind, therefore a different idea of heaven. There are 6 billion heavens -- not one.

However, we're all connected, so they're all connected. The state of mind is bound by the same spirit -- the human spirit. We all have it. That's why we all can connect with each other, despite so many unique differences. (One ocean, many drops of water.) We're all in this together. We all share something, whatever it is. I can't explain it. I can't even understand it. But it's there, and we all know it is (hence some of the stories on this thread).

Death is a part of life, that's all. It happens to all of us. There's nothing to be afraid of, there's no need to justify it, or rationalize it, or fight it. It is what it is -- sometimes too quick, sometimes too cruel, sometimes unfair, but life was never meant to be fair. Death is a part of life, nothing more.

The great mystery is: There is no mystery. Live your life, and live for that.

 

Buck - Very thoughtful stuff. Were you a philosophy major? Minor?

It's a fascinating field, though I get frustrated because there are no concrete answers. But I think that one should at least ponder the questions to live a full life.

 

Only dime-store philosophy.

Just put a lot of thought into this stuff, that's all. It works for me; doesn't mean it works for everybody.

 

If I die and go to hell, I've no doubt the jukebox there will feature The Beach Boys and Steely Dan.

 

"There is the fear that there is an afterlife but no one will know where it's being held.”
-Woody Allen

 

Before he was Bauer, Kiefer Sutherland was a Flatliner.

Seriously, someone tried to tell me that heaven was that 1,000-year reign where Jesus reincarnates all the faithful so it's a heaven-on-earth, and that hell was simply being dead with nothing after.

And maybe the saying is true: life sucks and then you die.

I don't know, and I'm not too sure that I care one way or another.

 

Just thinking about it gives me the willies.

 

Intellectually deceiving…means what?

 

If you believe in forever, than life is just a one-night stand.

And if there's a rock n roll heaven, well you know they got a hell of a band.

 

Outing alert: Buckweaver is...