My, my, how wicked we’ve become. The world is a mess. We’re in a world that’s working to numb us to our shared humanity. We lack compassion. There is a divisiveness breeding a dichotomy in which the lines between decency and malice have become so strong that little hope of compromise remains. This world has never known perfection, nor will it ever. Not long ago, we faced a call to action: “Can we all just get along?” This message, born from the chaos of the 1992 LA Riots, deeply echoed with hope subsequent to the cruel occurrence. It conveyed: We have seen our worst, and now we can heal. Simple, yet profound. For a time, the strategy proved successful. But in the last few years, galvanized resentment and escalating spiteful rhetoric have vastly changed the landscape of our complex humanity into an unpredictable and volatile one. Today’s collective psyche has long forgotten the essence of those famous words and is far removed from them. Our world today is uncertain—disqualified from decency and commonality. And sadly, we seem to prefer a dark road, away from civility, in the company of chaos: in the spirituality of Death.
There is darkness on the horizon.
Whether one champions right or wrong holds no consequence. Now we have summoned dark forces that are drawing thicker lines in the sand. These lines in the sand once meant a challenge: to create or declare an artificial boundary and imply that crossing it will cause trouble or resolution. Today, it represents a symbolic boundary that individuals avoid crossing because of an unwillingness to yield.
Nothing should surprise anyone in today’s polarized environment. Things are so bad you can’t reason and explain a point without an unintelligible, calculated, hatred-filled counterstatement—which only escalates matters to the level of physical threats. Harsh words and actions are now more common—like death and taxes, particularly as politeness insists on withdrawing from humanity. To take a line from “Meet Joe Black” on Death and taxes: “What an odd pairing.” And now you throw in passionate polemics, and it becomes a triumvirate for a new world order.
We are disconnecting. We are now more distant than we were when the world lived on the edge of past conflicts and insecurity. At least past times afforded a romantic perspective on existence, notwithstanding its difficulties. We have stripped ourselves of that romance.
Today, the world is wide open; we should learn from it. Exploring our world makes up not merely a physical and emotional journey, but a rite of passage.
Spirituality is the key to everything. Spirituality is a journey of self-discovery and self-healing. This topic does not require a religious focus. Call it…seeking wisdom or just growing up. The spiritual is the playground where your mind and body meet and coexist. It’s up to you to allow the man upstairs. However, this path leads into the deepest recesses of our beings, traversing life’s desolation as we seek self-understanding within existence’s vast tapestry. It should be the “Absolute” purpose.
Oh, but how deserted lies the Soul! It is barren from the vicious and escalating retorts of such a desensitizing world. Oh, my friends, we are lacking moral conviction and compassion. We are lacking spiritual discipline. We are living in a state of anomie: the absence of shared rules, standards, values, etc.
So I ask: why then invite Death as part of your journey? Why not live and let live? The burden of death on our minds throttles life. Death has its own purpose: it is the end of something great. Don’t simplify matters for him. Be great! Let him be!
But as the threatening rhetoric escalates, Death has positioned itself right alongside us on the journey. Who could blame him? We have invited him. We are ingratiating ourselves with him. The path to finding our worth and reinventing ourselves is unfortunately open to daily, dangerous deceptions. Death contrives to suck the marrow out of life.
Living in the absence of spirituality is dealing with the death of the spirit. Death of the spirit is the death of compromise.
What prompts inquiry into Death, or his spiritual dimension? Because he is omnipresent. An inexorable shift from “absence” to an active, constant, and lingering force. He watched from afar, waiting for his moment. Now, he’s a constant companion that shepherds our souls.
But why not Death? It’s relevant. Our polarized environment makes him relevant—more so now than at any other time. It’s the spirituality of Death. And what I mean by the spirituality of Death is that we’ve unburdened ourselves of living and burdened ourselves with his vision of all that’s wrong in this world, and yet we keep asking, “What is wrong with the world?” The spirituality of Death means accepting the vulgarity of it all. Making a complacent acknowledgment that Death is an intimate presence now. Deal with it. It is the willingness to do whatever it takes to serve a darkened, narrow-minded point of view.
But in understanding ourselves, we at least overcome our misunderstandings and the intentions of others. And if we don’t, then life becomes too linear, too fast, and we narrow our journey. It becomes too fast to look around; always in a hurry to get beyond the veil—but now Death is all too happy to ride alongside us because we are driving on its autobahn.
Linear living is like driving on the autobahn: too fast to discover anything; too fast to take the scenic routes; too fast to bridge such a magnificent world.
Obviously, I see Death poised; however, I am not without the ability to listen or compromise. I suspect my perception of him exceeds that of the common person, especially lately—it seems reasonable, does it not? He is only our invisible companion—the omnipresent 1,000-pound elephant in the room. My current perception of him—marked by curiosity and calm—contrasts sharply with past feelings of fear and anxiety. But you know what? I have Emily Dickinson to blame for introducing him as an embodiment of life—a palpable but unspoken presence: “We slowly drove—He knew no haste/And I had put away/My labor and my leisure too/For His Civility.” Dickinson romanticized him for me.
Ever since I read Emily Dickinson’s “Because I Could Not Stop for Death,” I have lived with this image—albeit a blurred one—of death as a gentleman caller. Propped in a devilish three-piece black chalk-stripe suit, a red handkerchief, a bowler hat, and a cane, traipsing around until needed. Though Death’s concept casts extensive shadows, he formerly concealed his approach, contrasting with his present overt stride.
Dickinson made me aware of him in ways I never thought of him before. She gave him life—personified him for me; added a human face. Given the world’s current linear mindset, he can abandon the grim, disheveled Grim Reaper persona and his past despondent tendencies. Now, the Dapper Dandy of Death is biding his time in idleness, while amongst us, content, whistling down the street, enjoying a world in chaos. I see him all too well.
Although, to be honest, I’ve never felt comfortable talking about death—too dark a topic. However, since I’m no stranger to frequent bouts of anxiety—horrified by a fear of dying that sometimes sprouts out of nowhere—I can relate. I dislike when the thought of death vacuums my sensibilities into a void where nothing exists but fear. I am trapped and claustrophobic. Following several minutes of breathing into a paper sack, I recognized nothing held more relevance than mortality, lurking nearby, present at each junction, poised to strike when opportune. I never expected it to be this tangible. Death had occupied my thoughts constantly: remote, hidden, pervasive, yet never this close. Death is impossible to ignore, but it’s getting harder and harder to disregard in today’s secular environment.
“Who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.” (Hebrews 2:15)
As a pessimist, and as a matter of perspective, I believe life to be linear: we are born, we live, we die; it’s as simple as that. However, I feel life’s answers emerge with a degree of proportion. Therein we start our journey. Our time spent on Earth is far too short. And it takes a much more direct and speedy route to our irreconcilable end when we limit our understanding of the world. We are limiting the possibilities for newer paths. From my perspective, the time wasted disregarding compromise with fellow man is time that gets us closer to the inevitable end.
Fear Death; his presence looms larger now.
In this explosive and volatile environment, it only means that Death has become an intimate friend. You just don’t know it. He is a part of every conversation—nuanced in the rhetoric we abuse and in the deliberate absence of goodness.
And when we narrow our moral scope, we shorten our lives. Exploring and connecting globally implies life’s fullness, which itself suggests proportionality. It allows us to open dialogues with humanity. It allows putting a human face on a friend. But it doesn’t matter how proportional our lives are if today’s discourse attracts us to the polarizing rhetoric that permeates our world today. It detracts from evolving.
These are disturbing times. Kindness perishes; its decline is starkly clear. There is no reason we can’t be idealistic and altruistic. But what we cannot be is egocentric and combative.
Existence presents a clear, unmodified voyage. Why allow unfulfilled potential to remain dormant when efforts are underway? Recuperating human decency relies on our life’s actions, provided that’s our desire, which it ought to be.
Today’s world offers scarce belief. And that is a big problem. To the faithless, there is no God—and if true, then Death has risen to be the greatest Absolute Monarch. In an inverted universe, it is perhaps the real journey. We all understand that death comes—eventually. We are born, we live, we die—that’s it. Death is the only certainty life decrees without equivocation. It is a boring simplification of life, but devoid of faith. And absolutism being a cause for achieving a higher plane, then Death is the ultimate and definitive absolute.
So why waste life inflicting pain, creating more divisiveness, or creating an avenue for Death to stride unencumbered? Have faith in humanity. Believe a little!
The post might not possess the linearity it could have, possibly extending excessively, considering the measure of death within. But life seems so unbalanced now. It is chaotic. How can we make sense of that alongside this post? Honestly, I lack the clarity to answer in earnest. I wish I had an absolute answer. My sole offering: life’s path seems straight, but our journeys diverge. Linearity is a sprint to an end that offers no proportionality. So don’t let it deter you from wandering. Don’t let it deter you from taking on an organic and random road in search of spirituality. It starts with being human. It follows with accepting the person next to you as a fellow human being.
Sure, signs along the way will always remind us of the inevitable end. Death is pervasive. It is there in front of us. Whether we want to believe in Death personified, we mustn’t lose sight of the fact that when we step outside the boundaries of humanity, alone, it is Death we will stare at. The isolation will have nothing to enrich our human decency. I’m trying not to contradict myself. We may explore our individuality provided we maintain civility. We can learn from one another. It’s a chance to enrich our lives with the promise of cultural uniqueness and mindfulness. Heck, there will always be crimes, mischief, and wanton deviant behaviour—as certain as death and taxes. But we can contain it if we share with each other a human face. If not, “Katy, bar the door.” The spirituality of Death is alive. Because nothing will stop the jovial Baron of Darkness from waltzing right up to our doors, tipping his hat, while a carriage awaits us for a gentlemanly ride for all eternity: “I first surmised the Horses’ Heads/Were toward Eternity.” And it will be sooner rather than later.
Photo by Echo Grid on Unsplash
