Making peace with your inevitable death
Everyone dies. Meditating on impermanence is one way to make peace with that.
I used to imagine my death while washing dishes.
Many years ago, I lived in an apartment in South Yarra, Melbourne. Small blue-grey place, short on natural light. The Indiana Jones poster on the living room wall really popped as a result.
The kitchen sink was in a corner; you stared at the convergence of wall and window whenever you tied up.
Doing the dishes there prompted in me a touch of existential horror. I’d be standing there, scrubbing a plate, and try to imagine the exact moment of my death. Would it be like falling asleep?
Rinsing a mug, wondering if there’d be a hazy to and fro as I shifted from life to death.
Sponging a knife, asking myself: will I know? Will I know that this, right here, this moment right now, is my last?
I tried to feel it in my chest, the single, final point of my life as I stood washing dishes, every time I washed dishes, drifting off into this open question about the only closed answer life has to offer.
It’s been dishwashers from there on out. Won’t live in a house without one.
Different types of dead-end thinking
I’ll be the first to tell you this wasn’t the most skilful response to the realities of crockery or mortality. But it – death, not kitchenware – has rarely been far from my mind.
Sometimes, it’s the intrusive thoughts of the depressive:
Thinking “it’s a good thing we don’t have guns in Australia otherwise I would’ve shot myself already” every morning upon waking.
The visceral rush of seeing myself, in a flash, stepping in front of my bus to work.
The breezy thought of “would someone try to save me if I fell on on the tracks?” as a train pulled into station.
These thoughts have been lifelong companions. They come and go. My dish-and-dreariness had a different tang.
That was an acknowledgement that, yes, I will die – and not by own hand. I don’t know when. And I was asking myself if I’d recognise death when it arrives, like an old friend returned.
But, then again, maybe it’ll be quite familiar. Death will visit upon my life in ways other than ending mine.1
The cat on my arm
I have a tattoo of my cat, Tim, on my forearm. It’s a silly bit of ink but I love it.
It’s based on a photo I took of him hanging on a screen door. I thought it’d be a great tattoo but dismissed it – “No, too silly” – for months.
Then Tim’s kidneys failed.
This was two years ago now. Early December, a warm Australian summer. He was vomiting a lot, wouldn’t drink water, hiding under a couch upstairs.
His usual vet couldn’t give him the care he needed. So we drove him to a 24 hour animal hospital about an hour away. His carrier on my lap, I opened the cage door and he didn’t try to escape. I held him the entire drive and decided, then and there, I was getting that tattoo no matter what.
Things didn’t look good for Tim. The vets were uncertain. He didn’t have many options: just fluids and hope.
Tim went into the hospital on a Sunday. A call on Monday prepared us for the worst. On Tuesday, the phone rang and – Tim’s fine. Eating well. No one knows why.
He was home that evening. I got the tattoo.2
Embracing impermanence
This might be obvious given the whole “cat tattoo on my arm” thing but I was a wreck on the Sunday and Monday. It was like my soul had collapsed into a neutron star.
One thing helped: a meditation on impermanence.
Led by Brother Bao Tich in the Plum Village app, the meditation walks you through impermanence on personal, collective, political levels. It reminds you that things are only possible because they end.
I still remember the first time I listened to it. Tim was at his usual vet for observation. We already knew things were dire. I was sitting on the floor upstairs, leaning against the wall, staring into the middle distance. It was hot. The room was bright and the air stultifying.
I opened the Plum Village app and searched for “death”. Eventually, I found the “Guided Meditation on Impermanence”.
Aware of my body, I breath in
Seeing the impermanence of my body, I breath out
Body
Impermanent
I could feel myself relax. The thoughts in my mind slowed.
Aware of the planet Earth, I breath in
Seeing the impermanence of the planet Earth, I breath out
The planet Earth
Impermanent
My breathing slowed down. The weight in my chest released.
The meditation continues, bringing to your awareness the impermanence of “the human species” and “governments”.
The final refrain:
Embracing the impermanence of everything, I breath in
Thanks to impermanence, everything is possible, I breath out
Impermanence
Hope
I felt something inside me collapse the first time I repeated that verse to myself. I tweaked the mantra, saying “everything is impermanent; thanks to impermanence, everything is possible” to myself countless times as we waited for news about Tim.
I’ve gone back to it again and again. Whenever I notice my thoughts drifting to death – my own, that of someone I love – it soon follows. It helps me return to the moment where, yes, death is a reality but, right now, I’m alive. This moment is alive.
Everything is impermanent; thanks to impermanence, everything is possible.
It’s not a short circuit or an escape hatch or a distraction. It’s a reframing, of sorts. It takes something inevitable and states it plainly:
Life is temporary. Because of that, new life will exist.
Saying “everything is impermanent; thanks to impermanence, everything is possible” to myself didn’t make the likelihood of Tim’s death feel any lighter. But it did make it feel more okay.
Who knows: maybe it’ll be the last thing I think. Maybe that’ll feel okay too.
I think about this too, of course. I’ve spent many nights in bed imagining the eulogies I’ll give my partner, mum, dad, and nan. Gotta say, some of them are getting pretty good.
And, yes, it’s silly.
