Bhutan's Dark Secret to Happiness

Reading the comments on Gina Trapani's "My Life in Weeks" submission I was surprised by how many commenters found the shortness of life terrifying or horrifying.

I read of the Bhutanese practice of contemplating death several times a day years ago. I found it to be very liberating and continue to practice it in my own way. When I get stressed out I think about the fact that I'm going to die. Often this brings makes me laugh out loud or smile. Not that I want to die, but it reminds me that more often than not that thing I'm stressing about just isn't that important.

I watched my mother and my grandmothers take their last breaths. All of their deaths saddened me and I - a grown man of 50 - still get teary eyed when I see the 14 year old girl's headstone a few plots away from my mother's. Jeez, even now I'm misting up thinking about her.

But, while I feel grief and sadness, I don't cling to it. The dark days make the light days brighter. Death, something we can't escape - would I want to? - is part of the circle of life. Heck, it's the circle of the universe from what little I know of astrophysics and cosmology.

Maybe I'm a weirdo. I don't have much money. My little hatchback has 260,000 miles on it. I don't care. I feel free. I can sit and enjoy a sunset without the pull to be doing something else.

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say, but, for me, life is better and valued more when we recognize and accept the impermanence of it all. To each their own.

For an extreme example of being very comfortable with death, I encourage you to read up on the Tibetan sky burial. Warning: the description can be very graphic. If you find Trapani's post disturbing this may not be for you. Right now anyway.