Little Black Book Index
“In the end, we are all sentenced to get what we want.”
— Charles Foster “Being a Human”
We live by our mythologies; we die by our mythologies. That resonates with me as an appropriate prologue and epilogue to a storied life. What myth was I given when I came into the world and what myth will assist me in leaving it? Our anthology of experience is often accompanied by introductions and conclusions, which every story offers; and we speak of them in finite terms until, of course, we live to witness our final conclusion. When that arrives in our mind, we may grasp for any temptation.
In the mortality of our reflection, hope saturated longings emerge. The life that seems cruel at times, containing moments of joy and cycles of disappointments, suddenly finds a nostalgia in us. Magical thinking colonizes our thoughts as a defense to the phobia of change, a change which in its most condensed form, is a mortal death. In this existential obstacle, not yet arrived, but no less real in scent and sense, compels us to seek a reprieve. We seek a better time, a better place, a return, or some youthful alexipharmic from the aging process; in relief, we seek paradisiacal revelation.
Stephen Jenkinson writes, “Dying is not what happens to you. Dying is what you do.” This suggests to me that the act of living is an apprentice to the act of dying; death is a consummation of living. It is also a confirmation of life. Joseph Campbell in his book “Thou Art That” writes, “The secret cause of your death is your destiny.” Suggesting that we know we have carried out our destiny when it punctuates our life. Campbell elaborates, “Every life has a limitation, and in challenging the limit you are bringing the limit closer to you, and the heroes are the ones who initiate their actions no matter what destiny may result. What happens is, therefore, a function of what the person does. This is true of life all the way through. Here is revealed the secret cause: your own life course is the secret cause of your death.” Therefore, “Death is understood as a fulfillment of our life’s direction and purpose.“
Our strange and paradoxical collective desire for an everlasting solution to escape from death, leads us to conjure imaginative temptations of thought. Ironically, these imaginative defenses free us from our very destiny by projecting a different outcome. If we adopt the belief of that safe and projected outcome, we can excuse ourselves from our destined portion of existence and in so doing, die perhaps long before we die. Whether Heaven, Hell, Gehenna, Purgatory, Valhalla, reincarnation, the underworld, or outer-space, we can make this projection of imaginative defense an idol. We can settle our phobia in solace before our idol.
“The scriptural picture of heaven is therefore just as symbolical as the picture which our desire, unaided, invents for itself.”
— C. S. Lewis
Death, it would seem, is the complete unity of life; a wholeness, a completeness, a oneness with creation. Even with the Chakras we see this idea in metaphoric terms. The 6th Chakra is not the highest, yet it classically represents the narrow passage of heaven. The 7th Chakra is classically related to union with creation, the universe, and the divine. Beyond the passage to paradise is where our great phobia of death lies. Complete and utter capitulation to union. The loss of what we know as our self. I am no longer I. True transformation occurs.
In Stephen Jenkinson’s question, “Who are the dead” he posits that we live with a chronic homelessness. He suggests that deep within us is the inability to feel at home. We do not have a place in the world, we do not know where our ancestors are really buried and so we make culture to try to create home, but it is not home. Our gods also, are homeless with us. Jenkinson posits, “From homelessness comes heaven. Wherever you find people advocating for heaven and trying to get you ready for it, you find people who have given up on the world, and particularly those who have given up on being at home here in the world.” His analysis would suggest that the creation stories of human beings (i.e. Genesis) is a story of homelessness. “Homelessness is the origin of human life in the world and it is the origin of culture. It is the beginning of physical frailty and the origin of the mayhem that humans have visited upon each other ever since.”
I began this piece by saying that our lives begin with and end with myth. We need our myths. It is not a question of whether our myth is right or wrong, plenty of blood has been spilled over this duality. It is a more urgent question of whether we fall prey to a temptation that arrests our destiny. To die is to be fully human and if we have been initiated in life, we are deftly skilled at being human. Jenkinson says it like this, “Uninitiated people are the people who are trying to die not dying.” Life gives us “the opportunity to be human.” It is not a given thing. Jenkinson continues, “Death is an epic mystery that will mean more than we can possibly mean by it.”
“I am assigned to myself alone.” Kierkegaard wrote “I feel no vain desire to show others the way.” I echo this sentiment as the epilogue to these musings. This is the only way, the principled way of a guide, mentor, or psychotherapist. By sharing this with you I intend neither to invalidate your feelings nor suggest I have an answer. I desire only that which I strive for in myself…
…to provoke the thought.
Steve
The passionate Phoenix of Firefly Horizons and conceptual prognosticator of Mutatis Mutandis reborn through the scorching forge of his annihilation into creative sanctuary. Steve translates the fury of his Phoenix experience into experiential exegesis in search of perspectives not yet in view. Read more about Steve • Articles by Steve
Leave a Reply