The Imminence of Death

How do we think of death? As a friend or a foe? As a release? As the end, or a new beginning? All we know for certain is that we will die – maybe in twenty-four hours, or in twenty-four years. But either way, our death is imminent.

In our society it is not polite to talk about death. People think it is macabre, that a person talking about it has a death wish or is morbid. It reminds them of something they do not wish to be reminded of. That’s strange, because when we watch TV, we see death, and when we read the papers, we read about death. This one shot in a hijacking, that one killed a little girl, hundreds die in earthquakes, plane crashes, tidal waves. We are constantly reminded of death. But somehow, we spin a gossamer cocoon of invulnerability around us: it won’t happen to us.

And yet, if this world and all its trappings is not our goal, if our goal is God-realization, freedom or enlightenment, then we have to think about death. We need to ask ourselves two questions: Do I remember at every moment that I am dying, and that everyone and everything else is also dying, and therefore I must treat all beings with compassion? Has my understanding of death become so keen that I am devoting every second to the pursuit of enlightenment? If we could say yes to these questions, then we would be learning to die while living – becoming aware.

This world that we live in is an illusion. Our minds, however, are so befuddled that we think all this is real and lasting. Our myopic focus on this life and this life only is the great deception. And in truth, this is the purpose of the mind: to deceive us. The more our attention scatters, the less chance we have to focus and be aware of the truth.

The first step in awareness is to realize just how far we have fallen, and then to decide to do something about it. Our lives seem to possess their own bizarre momentum. It seems like this because we have let our minds take control. Soami Ji says:

Weigh thou justly in thy mind;
The (so-called) gianis say
  by their intellectual understanding
That the world is a dream.
But by the currents of the mind
  are they carried away every moment,
And then they take the world as a waking reality.
_{Radha Soami Teachings}

Soami Ji is not saying that we shouldn’t use the intellect. We who live in this kind of world must use the intellect. First, we need to realize intellectually that the world is a dream, but then we need to realize that intellectual understanding actually means nothing. The intellect can only point us in the direction we need to go. But it can’t take us there! To get there, we need our Master’s grace.

When so many great minds have been deceived by the mind over the aeons, how lucky we are to have somehow acquired this grace to look beyond the mind. Unfortunately, even though we have a master, we still get trapped by the illusion and we sometimes feel lost and confused. Nothing seems to work for us, and it feels as if he has abandoned us.

When this happens, it is not because the Master has gone away or abandoned the soul or because he is not physically present. The Master cannot be anywhere else but right here, inside us, and in everything that we see or touch. But we lose focus, we lose our awareness of who and what we are and where we are going.

It is like going to watch a movie. When you sit down, you are aware of the people around you, the smell of popcorn, the chair you’re sitting in. But then the movie begins, and you become engrossed in the story. The movie becomes your reality.

Isn’t this exactly what happens to us in this world? Intellectually, we know this is an illusion: a play, as the masters call it. But birth after birth, we have become more involved in the play. The play of the world becomes our reality, as do our very intense and time-consuming jobs and relationships, our children, friends, our houses, or lack thereof. We have lost our awareness of the true, ultimate reality.

This illusion that we live in may be so all-pervading that the soul cries out, in Soami Ji’s words:

Life is so uncertain, brother,
  and I still haven’t unravelled its secrets.
What am I to do? …
  what can I hope for now, except death?
The Master then uttered his words of wisdom:
Have patience, O thoughtless one, why seek death?
Repeat the Name incessantly with your mind
  and hold the form of the Master in your heart.
_{Sar Bachan Poetry}

All the masters have said that we should do our meditation and keep the thought of the Master with us at all times. If we do this we are practising awareness and the process of ‘dying while living.’ It means bringing the scattered mind home. This meditation, this practice of death, is not something that we can force or make happen, as we do with so many things in the rest of our lives. It has to be approached differently. In our daily lives we strive. In meditation we must let go.

Isn’t this what our Master keeps on telling us? Just do your meditation. Leave it to the Master. Let go, let him do it. Don’t try to achieve anything. So-called “success” in meditation is not in our hands. All that happens is by his will. Just be still. Be there. The more we struggle, the more obstacles come in our way, and the road becomes difficult and tedious.

Our first misconception is that we have to get “results” quickly. That can only lead to disappointment. Of course, that does not mean we should neglect our meditation. It just means to approach it differently. We have to trust the Master implicitly and believe him when he says that everything will be okay if we just do our meditation.

Contrary to what we may think, meditation does not start when we sit down for it. Meditation has no start or end – it should be an ongoing practice. But for practical purposes, let’s say meditation starts with thinking about it. This is the beginning of awareness. It is making the mind receptive. These moments of awareness can be practised at all times, even during our busy days. All it requires is a quiet moment of stillness, a moment of remembrance, and then it is as if we never stopped meditation. The practice just continues seamlessly.

In that moment when we let go, when we stop thinking, when the mind is suddenly empty, the Master is there. He’s always been there, but at that moment, we remember. These moments are rare, and we therefore need to work at this, to just break our train of thoughts for a moment. Gradually these moments will increase until they become one continuous stream of remembrance. He will be in every thought, every action.

All of this is just the background. We haven’t actually sat down for meditation yet. Then when we do sit, we can go through a similar process.

We must start meditation with a clear mind, which first of all means to be awake – literally. Take the time to wake up. Why are we in such a hurry to start simran? Will it get us anywhere faster if we have a five-minute head start? We may fall asleep, or just give up if we rush.

Start the meditation by getting into the right frame of mind. Just settle down and think of him. Just let him be there. Take as much time with this as necessary. Being in the Master’s company in this state is meditation. This creates a state of calm waiting. Now we can start with the simran. This may just happen spontaneously. But don’t let go of the Master. Keep the awareness.

The power of simran lies in the fact that the Master gave those holy names to us. That means that the words we repeat are not just words. They carry the power of the Master. So, when we repeat them, let us treasure them. Let them remind us of our Master.

Just as we moved from calm waiting into simran, so there will come a point where we will move as naturally into the bhajan, or listening for the sound. At that point, simran stops. Everything stops. There is just sound. And this is where we really let go – where we can finally merge with the Sound of sounds. This is dying while living.