Category: Poetry

I’d like to share some reasons why I’m writing this blog, after reading an article today in the newspaper, by a palliative care person.  The writer encouraged families to talk about death. It was good to see a mainstream newspaper asking people to talk about their death and their dying arrangements. The writer was saying how good it is that dying and death can now be talked about – which is true. And, at the same time, I was struck with the contrast between the Buddhist approach to dying, and that presented in the article, which seems to me to be about having the happiness of sensory pleasure, in the last hours of one’s life. She talked about playing the Rolling Stones in one’s last hours; or, dying with a veal pie in your hand.

I know she was trying to be light-hearted, and I certainly don’t want to be overly-earnest. I think it’s so beautiful that palliative care people are dedicated to people’s happiness at the end of life. And, of course, the pleasurable death and the mindful death needn’t be two things. However, the kind of consciousness which we cultivate for that occasion, depends on how you see the opportunity that dying and death can be. Anyhow, I thought it a good moment to reflect on why I’m writing this, and the benefits of ‘A Year to Live’ practice.

I remember the time when I discovered that I had unconsciously been aiming at a pleasurable death. I was shocked. At the time, I was doing the ‘Dissolution of the Elements’ practice – and this was several years after beginning Buddhist death and dying practice. On this occasion, during the process I suddenly realised that I was attached to a pleasurable death. However, death may not be easy. There are no guarantees. I can’t know. The process needn’t be pain-free, even if you have done all your meditations for years on end. Your body shutting down its biological systems will not necessarily be a joy ride.

So, seeing directly that I had this hankering, my motivation shifted to simply accepting whatever is presenting; and remaining peaceful in my attitude, while not necessarily peaceful in the body. Right there, I realised that being conscious during death means accepting anything that happens, and it means a big mind of not-knowing. (Such an approach was helped by the fact that I never have a body free of pain, anyway; so such acceptance is helpful now.) So, I write to appreciate my ‘Don’t know’ mind.

I suppose that a lot of people, if they think about death at all, are more likely to prefer the veal-pie approach. The mindful death isn’t for everyone. Probably just for the few. I remember a friend saying to me, decades ago, that she’d rather not know what her mind was doing, so she wasn’t interested in mindfulness. I guess that a lot of people approach death like that – they’d rather not know what is going on in the mind, when death comes. So, I write these reflections, as a way to keep my own mind on the topic, yes; but also to get to know my own mind. I write to support those who have a like motivation.

I began this blog, too, as a response to the practice of a local Buddhist ‘A Year to Live’ group. They are people who want to bring dying and death into their path of spiritual inquiry.

But, even saying that, there are many aspects to spiritual life: for instance, living better now, and dying well, when the time comes. And there is: realising the luminous nature of mind – both now, and at the moment of death. As for the first part, the relationship is two-way. We lean and learn forward, toward death; but, the learning leans back, into enriching our living now. So, living well means we die well; and, bringing death to consciousness means we live well. That’s one of my themes.

Then there’s this other. I’ve seen something about consciousness, which is not ordinarily discussed. Indeed, in Australia it’s generally discounted. It is in the difficult-to-talk-about territory of the luminous, boundless awareness – and of a ‘deathless’ element. A few of my readers will find an interest in fathoming the very nature of what the Zen Buddhists call the ‘great matter.’ (How interesting that the verb ‘fathom’ means both to use a line to measure the deep, and also it means to embrace something with both arms. I think both of those meanings apply here.)

This, too, has its benefits in the present living, and its benefits at death. However, I also want that process of surrendering into the ground to contribute to the benefit of all beings, which I’m convinced it exactly the nature of mind. And, the ground state is also just to be tasted, exactly because it has no benefit. It’s just so. Personally, I want to be awake and aware of the changes during death, and taste the beauty of the pure ground state – just because it is what it is. In this sense, death is a sacrament.

Before us great Death stands
Our fate held close within his quiet hands.
When with proud joy we lift Life’s red wine
To drink deep of the mystic shining cup
And ecstasy through all our being leaps —
Death bows his head and weeps.

– Death, by Rainer Maria Rilke

Lastly, I write this blog, because some of us have had, or are having, a meeting with life-threatening illness. For us, the practice has a little more urgency, perhaps. We were living the trance of good health, without much of a sense of the certainty of death, and then some illness shook us, saying, “Hey! Get real. Don’t dream away your precious life.”

Thanks, Dear Readers, for listening.