Some Thoughts on Death

Hello there, I believe that death is not unnatural.  I believe that it is the most natural thing that exists, right next to life.  People die just about every second.  People are birthed at a similar rate.  I don't know how helpful it is to tell everyone that death is unnatural or that for someone to die at one age or another is not "right."  It is as if life is a promise and not a gift or experience.  It is as if we still, after all of this time, don't get how fragile this human experience is.  We have this tendency to decide that life is only valuable after being lived a certain amount of time.  That if you haven't grown up, or had your own children, a job, sex, etc. that death shouldn't touch you.  Now, let me clarify for those who may be freaking the f*ck out.  I don't believe we need to kill one another regardless of how natural death is (and the same goes for killing animals).  I just don't believe death is unnatural and I believe that we could help the healing process for all involved in losing loved ones (that would be all of us at some point) if we changed the language around it.

When we are told that death is wrong and that a mother should never lose her child we set all the mothers who will lose their children (and that is a large number of people, babies and children die all the time!) to feel a hell of a lot worse than if we let them know that, yes, death can come to your baby because your baby is a human being and once that baby exists it can cease to exist.  If we stop looking at death as this horrible, horrible thing and look at it as a part of the process of life we may not feel like we were cheated out of something that we were never promised.  We may be able to feel a little less victimized by the death and be able to actually deal with the means by which (especially when a child has been murdered).

It is so maddening to me that we don't discuss death.  It is so damaging to all who will lose their children, that we haven't had the conversations prior so that there is space to talk about it, so that after the ones who will not see their children grow up don't feel so alone in their grief.  So they can discuss their experience of death openly and get support around it.  Death isn't contagious, it is promised.  Death isn't bad, it just is.  We all will go through it.  We all will lose someone.  We have to, at some point, stop behaving as though ignoring it will make it go away.  Talk about it and sex.  The two things that we either make naughty or wrong are the things that are often used to cause the most pain.  Think about it.  When we categorize things as bad they become those things for us.  When you change the way you see things the things you see change.  It is true.  We are powerful enough to stop being victims.

Now taking someone's life is a completely different discussion.  Why, how, when, what?  All of those things need to be dialogued about as well… I will say that it cracks me up (in a not so funny way) to see everyone so up in arms (pun intended) about violence in a country that was built on violence, that uses violence to solve all issues and perpetuates it every way that it can.  If we wanted peace we wouldn't support war.  If we wanted peace we would never flip someone off and curse them out.  If we wanted peace we would be peaceful.  Period.  Start with yourself.  Start with your own heart.  Start with how you treat yourself and see how that changes the world.

xo

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