How do you live with death?

[Squares, the Cube]

Pass on DNA and knowledge... As long as my knowledge keeps getting applied forward through the generations, I won't die at all.

[Aldentron]

I will be attending a philosophical discussion group about death soon, here is the prerequisite listening, a Radiolab episode about the after life:
http://www.radiolab.org/2009/jul/27/

[Pizza_Pi]

Death is surely inevitable. But I don't mind if I die, for I feel no regret upon dying. That's because I lived my life as I wanted to, and did all I could in that life. I wouldn't care if someone would remember me or not, but if they did I would be happy they knew me. I would have no regrets that I lived a proper life, I have no complaints either. I live doing what I can to make the world a better place, and I'm very well happy doing that.

No entity on the face of the earth will ever truly die, for their path and their time line will always reside on the infinite time of the universe, they always have an effect, and always take up space in the physical known.

After death, there is a spirit and a soul left over, a soul without a body, with that entity still living onward. That entity may be stuck in a dilemma or problem, and continues to repeat that problem until it has been solved, until they're satisfied, and feel no regret. That is what we call ghosts. Those without regrets will not return physically. I am one without regrets, So I will not appear as a ghost of any sort.

There is far more to explain that relates to paranormal and spiritual activity, which is way too long and far off topic to explain here.

[flipsta_lombax]

I feel indifferent with death. It is inevitable, but I do appreciate that it's easily achievable. It's not something you should continuously think about lest you're suicidal. I see it as one passes, the world keeps revolving.

I've accepted that.

[who_cares973]

Originally Posted by Aldentron

I will be attending a philosophical discussion group about death soon, here is the prerequisite listening, a Radiolab episode about the after life:
http://www.radiolab.org/2009/jul/27/

this is a great listen

[ledwix]

Life having no set or objective value doesn't necessarily mean that suicide is a preferred option. In fact, in a meaningless universe, there is neither any reason to live nor any reason to die. The default position is to sit around and find out what exists and prioritize certain things and try to do those things. If, for example, killing yourself is the conclusion you come to, then so be it, but of course since all of us in existence are right now in the side of the living, most of us will find the idea repulsive. But some do not. Most people feel motivation to accomplish something, interestingly enough to me. If you do not feel motivated to act in any way at all, you will of course just sit around and die of starvation/thirst.

Overall, your priorities aren't even under your control. I will get hungry tomorrow whether or not I want to. I will want to be in the company of friends tomorrow whether or not I find friendships meaningful to the ultimate fate of the universe. Reality for us beings can be incredibly solipsistic in that manner. We live as if our values and priorities are objective, but many of them are simply programmed into us, and the rest are learned over the years.

As far as death, though...it's whatever. My own death doesn't scare me as much as the deaths of people I love. When I die, I won't have anything to worry about at all, just as the 13.7 billion years before I was born didn't feel so bad at all. But those who loved me during my life will be the ones who will suffer from that.

[Xiz]

Life is like a box of bad analogies.

[ScylaX]

Okay so here I'll develop what I think so it may be more intelligible for you guys. My terms will be misty at some point and I don't pretend to hold a perfectly clear language there, and I do this, because I don't consider my opinion of this as arguable, it's more of an observation than anything else.

Really, I think the question isn't "How do you live with death" but "How do you live with life ?"

I realized death didn't make me angsty, but my whole existence, the whole presence of the world was WHAT made me ****ing angsty about life.
I have this quote from Wittgenstein : "Life is the World."
What idea does this convey ? When you die, it's just as the World basically just vanished. That's right, it just doesn't exist anymore. When you're dead, you're excluded from the time (and that's the litteral meaning of "eternity"), it just doesn't matter what will happen one minute, one hour, or one decade after you're dead, nothing that exists in this reality matter any more. Reality just crumbled. Because metaphysically, it's just as everything died just with you. Time and space isn't important anymore. I begin to understand what Cioran said about birth : the true problem isn't to die, it's truly the birth. The moment when you come to existence, when you were separated to that very state in which things weren't necessitating any lack, anything , any questioning of any sort (because there wasn't any need to do this, everything there were pure possibilities, infinite and endless).

Being. That's a metaphysical burden. It doesn't matter with who you are, how you lead your life, not even if you're standing on your feets or if you're physically and biologically common to every human being. The fact you're being, for this very moment, ontologically positive. This is the whole problem.
And then, boom, you're living, experiencing things, asking questions, facing the whole universe with a totally specific point of view (and I mean, a human point of view, the human paradigm). That's actually a question of paradigm, because you're sinked in the paradigm of being human and existing according to this condition.
You're facing the universe, you don't know how big it is (and I'm not just speaking of spatial measures, it also involves time, complexity, all these things that constitue the cosmos and what's beyond it), it just is. It's vertiginous, kinda nerve racking, because when you're facing it, deeply thinking about that and feeling a bit anxious, you're not simply facing death, you're actually facing a total ontological intuition. The existence and nonexistence of things, which includes YOUR existence.
I don't have any basis to talk about this, and nobody has these. This is really hard to make sense in my head, or in any human head. It's just because this doesn't have to make sense : logic has to make sense, science too, the inner part of the world HAS to make sense. But what wraps it, what is beyond everything just can't be eluded - to be honest, the fact it doesn't need to make any sense or whatever that can lead you to further thoughts, the fact things just are as they purely are, it confuses my critical mind, I feel like I'm facing something way, way too big to grasp (you can call it God) ; and I think we're all on the same foot when it comes to this. You're facing a gulf, deep inside a cave, and this is so dark inside even trying to turn on a flashlight doesn't brighten anything, it's not that it's getting absorbed, it's just that it can't pass through this air.

So then, what to do with your life once you have this in mind ?
Actually, nothing specific. To be is an opportunity (and this is a true, horrid waste to suicide yourself - first because I consider a human life is sacred (and I'm not talking about this pro-life/pro-choice bullshit, this is another problem, a PRACTICAL problem), second because there is a LOT of other opportunities when life still grants you the possibilities to be physically autonomous. If you begin to contemplate suicide, and really want to do it, because you consider you don't have any other choice to fix your situation, instead of suiciding, just flee somewhere, leading for a better life, stop taking your situation seriously if you planned to die there, you have nothing to lose. Nothing.), in that case you just have to live in the world, fullfilling your deepest needs (if you don't need philosophy, then wait till you need it) ; I really don't know, I'm not that good of a moralist but you got the idea there. Just do what is necessary to view the world as a good place. Because the world is bad only if you motivate yourself to truly think that (remember the quote I put earlier). Just try to lead a sane and healthy life, something you can be proud of.
Finding sense to life is utter bullshit to me, because you can't find any, it isn't about "being happy" or "fulfilling it", don't put these superb, idealistic goals. Just aim for the simplicity instead of directly losing yourself in deep and metaphysical notions (I guess people tend to to that, to jump all the fundamental steps, because they think they are in a hurry or something - there's no better way to waste your life to me), I think this is a key.

I consider the pure existence as a complete misery. But this will not prevent me to enjoy this opportunity to life and experience things.
Yeah, this is just basically how I view things, a nice tl;dr if you ask me.