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Comment by gregjor | Hacker News Reader

Acceptance. No point worrying over something that will happen no matter what I do, or how much I worry about it. I just hope to die suddenly and unexpectedly, as Julius Caesar supposedly said. Odd, but the older I get the less afraid I feel about dying. I’m 60 now, don’t give it much thought other than thinking about how it might affect my wife and kids.

An eternity elapsed before I was born, and the universe will go on for an eternity after I die. Keep it in perspective.

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The problem is that this is the exact perspective I don’t want. I missed out on half the eternity and really don’t want to miss out on the other half.

It could all end tomorrow. True for any of us.

Fact is, we all get some time here. It is not much.

The other hard fact is, barring some reasonable fraction of time possible for us, what we, you, any of us want has very little impact on what we get.

You don't have to accept it. Whether you do, or not, mostly matters to you, and you don't have to tell either.

Maybe one day our understanding will allow us to transcend this state of affairs. I sometimes think about all the lost souls.

Then I think about the ones who will be just this >.< close!

Gotta be rough for them, right?

So, here is how I play it:

While I am here, I can amplify the good, love, laugh, play, do, build and the way I see it, am lucky!

I am here, there is a lot to do, people I love, much to experience.

Was a free ticket to a great ride!

When it ends, I won't be worried any more than I was before getting that ticket.

So far, nobody reports back. When it is over, it's over.

There are other travellers here. Ticket holders. Sure glad for that! We don't have to do it alone, and I found someone! She is the best. That helps a lot.

All told?

Very nice problems to have. No complaints!

I do not think about it much past that.

Travel well. Enjoy the ride. That's what a lot of us do.

...or not.

Works the same either way.

It is oddly comforting to see it written out like this. Probably because this is mostly mirroring my thought process. I also think about the people who didn’t (won’t have? will not?) make it past whatever medical breakthrough allows us to renew our bodies indefinitely. And then those who die on the way to the doctor’s office to have the procedure done. And somehow seeing that written by someone else makes me feel mildly better that I’m not alone thinking about this and maybe someone out there will figure out some of the answers in my lifetime.

And you are right that it’s probably best to enjoy the ride while on it and not worry about what happens when you get off. Just need to realign my brain to not have it remind me every five seconds that falling off the ride sucks. Or that I might get off and the ride will keep going without me and that I might be the one who misses the news and improved ride by like six months or a day or ten years or ten centuries or whatever.

Of the things I’ve read in these comments so far, this and the link to the Harvard researcher working on cell regeneration have been the two things that calmed me down the most. Yeah this one more so, which I found surprising. Thank you.

You are most definitely not alone.

And you reached out unabashedly!

Thought I would keep it real, one traveler to another. You are deserving.

Glad it helped.

Remember, you don't have to accept it. Anything can happen! Maybe it will.

What you want, in this case, makes no difference. Desire is the root of all suffering. Try to make the most of the time you have, stop squandering it with worry and desiring things you can’t have.

My philosophy professor would say exactly that, and then counter it with the fact that without desire you can’t make the most of anything because you can’t do anything that you’ll find meaningful. To desire is a very human thing to do and denying all desire is probably closer to death than not, no?

Your philosophy professor would recognize one of the four noble truths of Buddhism. Life has no meaning or purpose, so you can’t find any. You can try to find contentment, and it’s easier to do that by removing desire and disappointment than striving for the impossible.

You have expressed real fear and unhappiness. And lots of desires that you realize you can’t fulfill. Examine the relationship.

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