For most of us, dying feels like being kicked out of an airplane without a parachute. We usually die the way we live. Having had trust and love for people and life, we die having trust. Having been curious and attentive to the moment, the new, we are curious and attentive while changing form. Having surrendered to life, neither resisting nor hanging on to, we neither resist nor hang on to life during our last transformation.
But most of us spend a life building castles in the air, ending up with a million unfinished construction sites on a little island we call “my life,” surrounded by an unknown ocean of uncertainties, distraction and destruction – an endless sea. When death approaches, when the clock starts ticking, when time is running out on us, we start reflecting. All we have is a little dingy leaky rowboat at shore in case of an emergency. We may have tried to build safe castles, nets of beliefs, hope and convictions, but honestly, we have never found out what life is really all about. Intuitively we know we have missed something. So when our time comes, we are not really prepared. We will be kicked out of the airplane and become unconscious. We know nothing of the potential that lies in dying. We know nothing of the inner joy of transformation. All we fear and know is that we will have missed out on something.
When finally storms and fire break out, when our little safety nets and castles evaporate, when we eventually become old and sick, a burden to others, when we hardly make it to our last retreat – our little leaky dinghy for the first time – going out into the complete unknown, completely unprepared … what is probably going to happen? We may sink and will be swept back to shore. Lesson flunked. Repeat.
Few people live simple lives in a hammock with a little fire at their side and a handy fishing boat that they sometimes use for sailing out into the wide open. But honestly, most of us have to withstand quite a few thunderstorms and severe weather before we truly begin to appreciate a safe haven and a nice little reliable sailing boat.
When old age and sickness come to those who are quite familiar with the sea, who are used to sailing alone into the unknown, into the quiet, into what some people may call death, they are at least prepared. They are accustomed to sailing. It’s become a habit, a fun hobby. So when death comes, they do what they’ve always done – go sailing.
