Death – Just What is It Really?

Death Journal Quilt – 8-1/2 x 11″ by Anne Copeland. Reverse Applique and Painting with Hand Stitching.

I read somewhere on the Internet today that Johnny Lang, a well-known and talented musician, had presumably committed suicide. He was not very old, and it got me to thinking about this thing we call death.

Actually, I am doing some wonderful studies (I am in my second year) with this school out of England, The Silent Eye Mystery School. You can look it up, and the studies are by correspondence and special events that take place in the U.K. for those who are able to attend them. The people who founded this amazing school are Steve Tanham, Sue Vincent, and Stuart France. They are all well-published authors with many books out. In a short time, I believe that Steve Tanham will be giving a talk on that very subject. I won’t write more about it because if you are interested in knowing more about the school and what they teach, you can look them up on Facebook, and many other areas of the Internet. All I can say is that it has majorly changed my life and the way I think about life and death, spirituality and many other things in general.

When I was growing up, the challenges I faced were overwhelming, especially as a child, and death then seemed like a friend. For me in my youth, it seemed like a way to go to sleep and be in peace, safe from everything that might hurt me any further. I was ten years young the first time I became serious about it and tried to end it. luckily unsuccessfully. I think a lot of folks have thought about it like this.

The reality of death is that we really don’t know what it is or what it means. We have many ideas about it, and for most of us, it seems very permanent. Some believe we will end up in another place which some call Heaven, and perhaps others call Nirvana but that is something that people can hope is truth. Still others believe that we go to a place called Purgatory, between Heaven and Hell whatever we choose to think those places are. It is not my intention to insult anyone with what I am writing about here. I am simply exploring the ideas that exist and I hope that everyone will remain open-minded.

The day my own mother died, I did not know it, but I was out working in my tiny garden. There was a statue there of an angel, and suddenly for no reason, it fell on me, hurting me badly, and I lay there wondering what was going on. And likewise, the day my dad died, I also did not know it, but I fell three times and each time hurt myself badly. Once I stepped out my front door of my mobile home, not remembering my porch was being worked on and there were no steps at the front door, so I fell down. Later I would learn that while my dad was in a nursing home, and had to get up in the night. He fell down more than once also, breaking his hip. He laid there for hours, and when they finally came to get him, they decided just to keep him sedated solidly until he eventually just went to that final sleep.

So I guess in the end, I have no more answers than when I started this column. I guess it inspired this art piece above as I tried to come up with something that made sense. Some deaths seem to come from “natural causes,” while others might come from some form of violence, But is that death itself, or what signals that state? I will be interested to know what others think about death, if they do, and I hope that anyone who writes will be respectful and realize that we all have different ideas, and none of us really know fully what death means. It seems to be something permanent, for I have not known anyone to return again once they really leave, but is that really the end of everything? Thank you all very kindly.

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