Life: There's No End To It

At any given moment, without notice, you or I might encounter the end of life in a body. Rationally, we’ve always known this human experience is terminal. “Nobody gets out of here alive,” is the witty version of this reality. Many people ponder death, at least periodically, and more so by those who are closer to the age when bodily demise is statistically most frequent and likely.

Since my close brush with mortality a few years ago, and as I experience the aches and limitations of an aging body, its impending certainty flashes in my mind with regularity. When these thoughts visit, the mood is more curious than despairing. Regrets for the past are largely resolved and hopes for the future are held lightly, with gratitude sans expectation, for each new day. What dominates my contemplation of death these days is the question, “What dies? and What remains?” No doubt such curiosity has accompanied a narrowed spiritual focus; exploring the nature of self and the practice of self-inquiry (atma vichara in Sanskrit).

Self-inquiry was the practice of the great Indian sage, Ramana Maharshi which led many followers to realize mukti (liberation).

When Ramana Maharshi, as a 16-year-old boy, became overcome by the fear of death, he simply lay down on his bed and thought to himself, “I'm going to die. What's going to happen to me? I'm going to lose everything, my parents, my friends, my thoughts, my feelings, my sensations, my perceptions, everything is going to be taken away from me. What will remain of me? “

That's all he did. He just asked himself, “What will remain of me when everything I know will be removed from me.” And so intense was his desire to know what would remain of him when everything that could be removed from him, was removed from him, that the nature of his essential self became clear to him in that moment. His essential, unqualified self-aware being prior to any conditioning of objective experience stood revealed, and he recognized that it had always been there and was not subject to any change, even death of the body. That was it, that's all that happened. He didn't become enlightened, he didn't have some mystical experience, he just recognized the nature of himself. And so clear was this recognition that it never left him again.

We too can explore what we truly are, and by looking deeply at what we call “I” discover the formless, sense of being itself without all of the obscuring and temporal qualities of humanness that are subject to harm and loss. We can do this intentionally or it may come as a grace in a desperate moment of life. Often times when I'm at my most exasperated self, I finally let go and surrender my willful resistance to life. In those precipitous moments, I am a candidate for greater insight. Even, and perhaps most profoundly, in the experience of loss, I am confronted with the reality of what remains. And what remains when I am stripped of some external accouterment of human life, is the transcendent, ever-present sense of pure being. This is much subtler than our mind can comprehend but paradoxically it could be no more obvious. It is the “I”; awareness of existence itself. It is the I am, that I am. It is the most undeniable, reliable assurance of our true existence, evidenced by formless, pure awareness.

You and I can take refuge in this sacred place of awareness. Even when life is breaking down all around us, we can nonetheless be safe and comforted here. And by resting in this place of knowing, we can refresh our perceptions, and find innovative and creative ways to deal with life that can ease and bless our days on earth.

In the scriptural account of the Easter story, Mary Magdalene stares into Jesus’ empty tomb and she is asked by the angels, and moments later by Jesus, why she is weeping. Of course, from a human perspective, we understand her sorrow. But there's more going on than meets the eye. She is invited to see, as are we, the evidence of Life energy within and around us. From the enlightened perspective, that sees beyond appearances of loss, Life goes on. When we attach to a person or a set of circumstances our very sense of self-worth and wholeness is vulnerable to loss when they fail us. But the good news that Easter proclaims is that Life is not restricted to a body, nor can it be contained by any “tomb.” Life is irrepressible. It may change form and for a time seem to be lost, but it cannot be. The Infinite life that we call God is everywhere present in its fullness at every point in time and space. Only our deepest awareness of Life within reveals the new life that illumines every moment. Resting in this pure awareness reveals its limitless, infinite nature. See for yourself. There’s no end to it.

Happy Easter

Rev. Larry