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Thread: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

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    God/dess LuckiCharm's Avatar
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    Default Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I was thinking about posting this in "members only", so if it needs to be moved there, my bad.
    I've been thinking about death lately, an I'm curious to what you all believe happens to us when we pass away. I'm actually feeling kind of nervous about the whole subject...

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I'm a nursing student, and I used to work in a nursing home. As long as death comes at its time, or if a person was suffering so much that death is better, I'm pretty okay with it. However, I personally fear a long, painful, drawn out time BEFORE death like Alzheimer's, Terri Schiavo, a stroke, etc. That's why I'm going to give myself a hot shot of heroin if I ever start getting feeble.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I believe there is an afterlife... of what sort, I don't know. I'm fairly certain that reincarnation exists, especially in the sense that the same spirits occur in every life you had, for ex: last time your husband may have been your mom, and your best friend may have been your brother, and your brother may have been your dad, and your sister may have been your wife (because last time you were a man!) etc etc.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I love the subject of death ... I don't believe it is morbid at all or depressing.

    I like to use the word transition more than death/dead/passed on and so forth. I learnt about this word and the subsequent meaning behind it when I did the Rosicrucian Home Study Course (or some such thing) quite awhile ago at one point.

    I don't regret paying the money I paid for that course as it helped me define my thoughts and beliefs even a little more... allowed me to learn about another path.

    I believe that no matter what happens to our selves on this plane of existance.. that when we transition.. death is the great leveler. We are all equal in the end as honestly even the "evil" people in this world are linked to a higher soul (which has many lives) who is just trying to learn and figure things out as such.

    I don't believe in a God, Goddess and Great Spirit per say as actual beings ... I believe in them in more the Carl Jung archetypical sense. I also believe that if you put enough thought/belief into something you can create it and thus it can become a being.

    Oh.. My beliefs incorporate a bit of everything... some science, some paganism (the concept of The Summerland), Roscrucianism and so forth.

    Death is just another part of life ... without it we couldn't really have life.

    Life, growth, death, re-birth and the cycle goes on and on for infinity.

    Yes I have a healthy fear of death in that I value being alive and would rather be alive than dead overall.... yet I also do not fear it even if it is nothing... I don't believe in a negative afterlife or hell or anything along those lines.

    I believe that the afterlife is just the afterlife... it is the ultimate mystery.


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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by austinatalie View Post
    ... and your best friend may have been your brother, and your brother may have been your dad, and your sister may have been your wife ... etc etc.
    Deep in the woods maybe...

    Seriously though, there's a difference in one's own believe of transition or afterlife and death itself. Once you have lost a loved one, your whole perception changes. Even if you don't believe in an afterlife, you still hold hope that you will see them again in some form or fashion.
    Personally I don't think there's a heaven, or hell, or any other form of "region" that holds our souls, but that shouldn't turn anyone off from leading his or her life to the best of their ability. Also, I don't think that anyone should fear death itself... but nobody should have to go violently or in great agony!

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    Veteran Member thefrog's Avatar
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    we are born only to die. every day we get closer to it. no way to stop it.

    i want to live, but i dont care when i go. been working around death and the such for 21 years now, i just dont want to suffer.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I feel very similarly to GoldCoastGirl I think. Death doesn't scare me. It's not morbid to me. It's a transition just like everything in the cycle of life.

    I used to believe in an afterlife after a ressurrection in paradise on Earth back in the day - as a child being raised a Jehovah's Witness. But I'm very different now.

    I'm not sure if the transition is literal in that I will be the same being as a spirit. i know my energy won't be lost even if it means that my "dirt" is what's helping something new (like a plant) grow. Get what I mean?

    I don't feel like this is all that there is to life. This might be all there is to this PART of my life. But I also don't believe I'm a fully evolved human being. I feel like a newbie so to speak. I'm not quite an "old soul."

    Quote Originally Posted by GoldCoastGirl View Post
    I love the subject of death ... I don't believe it is morbid at all or depressing.

    I like to use the word transition more than death/dead/passed on and so forth. I learnt about this word and the subsequent meaning behind it when I did the Rosicrucian Home Study Course (or some such thing) quite awhile ago at one point.

    I don't regret paying the money I paid for that course as it helped me define my thoughts and beliefs even a little more... allowed me to learn about another path.

    I believe that no matter what happens to our selves on this plane of existance.. that when we transition.. death is the great leveler. We are all equal in the end as honestly even the "evil" people in this world are linked to a higher soul (which has many lives) who is just trying to learn and figure things out as such.

    I don't believe in a God, Goddess and Great Spirit per say as actual beings ... I believe in them in more the Carl Jung archetypical sense. I also believe that if you put enough thought/belief into something you can create it and thus it can become a being.

    Oh.. My beliefs incorporate a bit of everything... some science, some paganism (the concept of The Summerland), Roscrucianism and so forth.

    Death is just another part of life ... without it we couldn't really have life.

    Life, growth, death, re-birth and the cycle goes on and on for infinity.

    Yes I have a healthy fear of death in that I value being alive and would rather be alive than dead overall.... yet I also do not fear it even if it is nothing... I don't believe in a negative afterlife or hell or anything along those lines.

    I believe that the afterlife is just the afterlife... it is the ultimate mystery.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by thefrog View Post
    we are born only to die. every day we get closer to it. no way to stop it.

    i want to live, but i dont care when i go. been working around death and the such for 21 years now, i just dont want to suffer.

    I totally agree w/ you..

    I've been so close to death all my life..I've had countless near death experiences that death doesn't scare me like it use to.. I just don't want to die from a huge slab of concrete or something else falling on me..

    My biggest fear is not being here for my nieces and nephew.
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Well, most people struggle to come to terms with death. They want to fit it in, somehow and correctly, with an understanding that allows them to acknowledge it and move on.

    I really am fascinated by it though. I look forward to it as I do any event in life, but I am patient.

    Even if there is nothing, I want to know, even if it means I don't know long enough to process it, or I stop processing and never know...I do want to experience it when it's time though.

    I see it as such an open ended thing, so many possibilities. I want to know how the release of life feels, the struggle, strength, and power to hold on for just five more minutes, the power of your connection to whatever it is in this world that helps you stay when all parts of you have let go.

    I'm interested....

    I've been asked many times, due to turning away from most religions, what my feelings are of heaven/hell and I always say that for me to be perpetually happy, you would have to remove something from me because my happiness is the result of my hard work, bad times, and perseverance over those times and my enjoyments of those rewards. I know happiness because I know pain. Heaven (though I'm not saying it exists, but this definitely pissed off the priest) makes no sense to me, as he explained it, because you would have to REMOVE a part of me to be perpetually happy. Sure they can make a heaven just like life, but why not...life again?

    Hell makes a TON more sense. It's easier for me to believe in an eternal pain because for me to be hurt, beyond the physical, I would have to know that it's keeping me from the happy, which means I'm still me. Hell to me would be achieving then having that achievement ripped away to start again.

    So, MY kind of afterlife, where I given the choice, would be an existence where I could sit and watch the life/existence of my family as it grows and passes until that existence fades into nothingness.

    I have no problem with nothingness at all.

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    Kaylinn
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    It's not the death part that freaks me out, it's the way we handle a death. With a funeral....grieving over a dead body....
    That freaks me out so hard. I am anti funeral. I have very specific directions that if/when I die..I want no funeral. I want noone to look at my dead body. Just cremate me and throw the ashes out.

    As far as the afterlife...I honestly do not know. I'm inclined to think we're just worm food....but I hope I'm wrong. I have a slight interest in reincarnation...and would also like to think that everyone in our life was also in our past lives, particularly our Signifigant other....but who knows?
    I also wonder.....if our spirits do go somewhere.....i only wonder that becaue of a particularly freakish incident with my grama when she died....

    I don't know what to think. I guess I'll find otu someday.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    yea, I'd love to get buried in the ground to return to the earth, so to speak, but that whole non-biodegradable-100k casket makes NO fucking sense to me. I'll decompose in IT before IT decomposes, not too mention, I don't know what an asston of formaldehyde is going to do for the earth...

    Maybe I'll give my shell to science. I dunno. I just don't see the value... put me in the ground as-is so I can give back...and, I don't know, model a realdoll after me if my parents need to have a body to grieve for, then if my girl gets to live past me, let her take the realdoll home
    People are not ruled by their memories.

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    Vivacious
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    It's so strange to me that my body is going to start failing me. If it's cancer, then my cells are going to be turning on me. You know? It's horrible. We are destined for death.

    Thinking about it makes me cherish the good people in my life. I know when I go, they will be what I'm thinking about, and that might even put a smile on my face. (And I love my kitty cats too!)

    We're all in the same situation, humans, animals...that's why I wish we would get along. Oppressing others isn't going to give us longer lives. It's sad to me when people put everything into the afterlife or when people are so greedy and hateful, like where they are today is all that counts. Like stealing a little more or killing a little more will buy them more time. It won't.

    It's something in between that matters. The precious little moments of "now."

    To answer your question more directly, Lucki, I think anyone who's realistic has to struggle with the idea of being immortal. It's beyond sad that we all have to go.

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    madmaxine
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I'm not scared of death. What scares me is passing before I have a chance to complete the "tasks" I was put on this earth to do (care for parents, help provide for younger relatives & make the world a better place.)

    I come from a culture that doesn't shy away from death so I always thought there was more than this life. Of course, intellectually, I can entertain the idea of "Nothing" after physical death...But I don't believe that.

    Funny you should ask this....A few nights ago I was talking to an oncologist at the club and he and I were of the same mind on the subject..and he's seen hundreds of deaths in his career.

    You should be more afraid of not living life than dying.

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    Jay Zeno
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    "Don't take life so seriously. It's not permanent."

    Death is the most natural part of life there is. Life feeds on death.

    Somewhere in all this abstraction and consciousness, there's a feeling that it must live on. I have that feeling, too. But is it real or wishful thinking? I don't know. I don't even know if I'll find out.

    But whether or not there is an afterlife, or an eternal reward or punishment, or nothing at all, we owe it to our species to be the best that we can be, for ourselves and for those around us, so that our legacy is to work for our own ultimate improvement.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Life itself is ongoing and eternal, especially when you view it from a global scale. But it seems to be cyclic, and it seems that in order to have life, you have to have death as well.

    I never was much for babies until my mom and my best friend died within three days of each other almost two years ago. Suddenly I saw how precious they are.

    I miss them both more all the time, but I carry them within me, through the influence they had on me, at the least.
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I wish in American culture that we dealt with death on a more personal level. The only time Americans encounter death personally is either by profession (doctors, morticians, hospice workers etc.) or by accident (discovering your loved one passed during the night). Otherwise, death is not discussed. There are no traditions or rituals that help us to cope with death. When a person says "My loved one died last week" the vast majority respond with awkwardness and mumbled condolences. It seems in secular society we've lost our comforting traditions surrounding death and it leaves us feeling lost and wandering.

    It saddens me that Christian culture teaches that death is to be avoided. The implication is that death would be relieved by God once the population gets rid of sin and all could return to Eden. The Jehovah's Witnesses take this literally. Most faiths see it as a metaphor for heaven or the undying soul.

    The thing about modern views on death is that if a person is suffering and known to have a terminal disease, then why work so hard to keep the person living? I hope that if I'm dying of some awful disease (like cancer) that if my time is near, please don't force feed me, please don't pump me full of drugs in an attempt to extend my life. Just give me my pain meds and let nature take it's course.

    The Teri Schivao case angered me because I felt the husband was actually the one who was being merciful. Her soul was imprisoned in her body, and the medical care she was receiving was able to prolong her imprisonment. Anyone who can envision themselves in that situation would be absolutely terrified that something that awful might happen to him/her in modern society.

    There is also the case of the Doctor in New Orleans that had to make the most difficult decision that one could make. Her patients were too sick to be moved. If she attempted to move them, they would have died. Then the storm hit and we all know the results of that. The power didn't come back on (and still isn't on in the area of that hospital). The patients were not only dying, but suffering terribly as well. If they were moved, they would die. If they stayed, they would die. Allegedly she gave patients lethal doses of morphine.

    She was arrested, tried and cleared by a jury only just this summer. Personally, I hope I have a doctor with that kind of compassion if ever I find myself slowly dying in a hell hole.

    Just because something is legal or illegal does not make it moral or ethical. Before too long, the ridiculousness of death prevention would result in a legal investigation if a person dies without first getting medical clearance to do so from a panel of doctors.


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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastridonicus View Post
    yea, I'd love to get buried in the ground to return to the earth, so to speak, but that whole non-biodegradable-100k casket makes NO fucking sense to me. I'll decompose in IT before IT decomposes, not too mention, I don't know what an asston of formaldehyde is going to do for the earth...

    Maybe I'll give my shell to science. I dunno. I just don't see the value... put me in the ground as-is so I can give back...and, I don't know, model a realdoll after me if my parents need to have a body to grieve for, then if my girl gets to live past me, let her take the realdoll home
    With the "green" movement, natural burials in wood boxes or shrouds is gaining popularity.

    Eco Cemetery


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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Most of the time, i think that after death there is a state of nothingness. Like you just fall asleep and don't wake up and you just cease to exist. But at the same time i belive in reincarnation. So i don't really make sense to myself. i do know that i am freaked out by the idea of a funeral, i'vwe never actually been to one since my parents tried to keep me sheltered so that may have something to do with it. This does make me remember to live each day to the fullest though.

  19. #19
    madmaxine
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    IMO a great series to watch to get some mental bearings on death is HBO's "Six Feet Under" (available on DVD.)

    & Another fascinating hobby is to research different cultures around the globe & how they deal with death.

    (Heh I told myself not to comment again so as to not seem morbid. LOL)

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by pinkkitten View Post
    Most of the time, i think that after death there is a state of nothingness. Like you just fall asleep and don't wake up and you just cease to exist. But at the same time i belive in reincarnation. So i don't really make sense to myself. i do know that i am freaked out by the idea of a funeral, i'vwe never actually been to one since my parents tried to keep me sheltered so that may have something to do with it. This does make me remember to live each day to the fullest though.
    Funerals aren't so bad. They are cathartic for the survivors. People cry, but they also laugh and joke around. They get together and eat a nice meal. Sometimes people dance. Aside from the casket, there isn't a huge difference between funerals and weddings.

    The sense of community at a funeral is important. I'm sorry that your parents didn't let you attend funerals. I'm sorry that they didn't let you express your feelings of grief amongst loved ones. It is this very "sheltering" that I referred to in my above post. An isolated suffering of grief prolongs the grief. Everyone needs closure, even children. That is what funerals are for.

    (Max, I'm kind of morbid, too.)


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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    ^^^ See, the sad part is i've never been to a wedding either. i had a strange family and everything was just kinda kept hidden, or minimized to the point that growing up i was not aware of it's meaning. My mom was not close to her family so all i remember as a child was a phone call in the middle of the night when someone died and she would not even show emotion over it. It's sad but i don't know how to grieve. When one of my beloved cats died 6 months ago, i just kinda bottled it up and went to work and did everything as i normally would.

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    Veteran Member jessica_rabbit's Avatar
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Knowing that I'm going to die someday deeply frightens me. Thinking about it extensively is enough to send me into a panic attack. I have some issues I guess.

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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by Kaylinn View Post
    It's not the death part that freaks me out, it's the way we handle a death. With a funeral....grieving over a dead body....
    That freaks me out so hard. I am anti funeral. I have very specific directions that if/when I die..I want no funeral. I want noone to look at my dead body. Just cremate me and throw the ashes out.
    I just have to agree with Kaylinn. 5 years ago my mother died from a massive stroke while on vaca in AZ. I flew out there and she knew I was there.

    Anyway to the point, as she laid there still living you could sense "her" for the lack of a better term. But, as her body gave out, and she was promounced we were able to go back to see her, and it wasn't the same person. It sounds strange but the personallity, etc that made her left. And what was left was the "shell".

    I get asked by my family how I handled it, didn't cry, etc, but what I did in the hospital made me realize my thoughts and feelings on life and death.

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    God/dess GoldCoastGirl's Avatar
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    Thumbs up Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    Quote Originally Posted by thefrog View Post
    we are born only to die. every day we get closer to it. no way to stop it.
    we aren't "closer" to it each day we live.. it lives side by side with life. From the time we are even conceived we can die (abortion, misconception etc) so thus as we have life there is death. It lives side by side in harmony with life.

    Thus the reason I don't fear it persay as I could literally up and die right this very moment... whilst I am posting on this forum.. so instead of living in fear of something that is so natural to this world and helps keep it functioning (even stars live and die).. i choose to just live.


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  25. #25
    Darcy Foxx
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    Default Re: Death...Depressing subect, I know.

    I believe that when we die, that's it. I don't believe in a God, a heaven, a soul, or an afterlife of any kind. I don't believe that we leave any conscious thought behind. I believe that we exist solely because science allows us to exists, and once we die it's like a light going off and we're just completely and utterly 100% GONE. I'd like to believe in some kind of afterlife, cos it's a much more comforting thought, but without solid scientific proof I just don't believe in anything.

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