Slowly Dying

I dunno about posting on the LSD forums, a lot of the people on there are completely full of shit or themselves. I will write a paper about this though, it's an interesting idea to further develop.

"I'm alive, therefore I'm dying". I like that.

 

I know exactly what you're saying, but the idea that we are "dying" is just a fancy, more shamanistic way of meditating on the idea that we some day will die.

I totally agree with you also that to be aware that we are dying does not keep us from living. This is going to sound crazy to you, because I honestly think you assume that I have a less developed view of reality than you, but I am very reconciled with the fact that I some day will die. I meditate on it a lot, and am very comfortable with it. Having been physically ill for the past few years, I have been forced to reconcile myself with the fact that the body is doomed to failure.

I am also aware that in that ultimate reality - the one existing outside of normal human perception - what you say might hold very true and I probably don't understand it well, having not taken acid or shrooms, or deeply meditated before, but at the same time, I think for general purposes, as a sole, existing, individual, on a conscious basis.. I believe that you are alive now, and some day you will be completely dead whether this will happen slowly, or suddenly, one cannot know. I just think you guys are getting way to excited and trying to glamorize an idea that is just as viable as my own - its just a different way of looking at things, and in that sense maybe I should appreciate it instead of arguing so vehemently.

 

I can relate. :cheers2:

 

How do you know your name?

 

Yet again, I disagree. At the point of our death life and death are exactly the same thing. They both end and begin together.

 

I would read this. This whole concept fascinates me and I think i AM learning something.

 

i like to look at it like this: we are born, and we slowly gain more and more consciousness till we reach the pinnacle of ability and knowledge and awareness, and then we begin the slow and inevitable decline back into that almost childlike, profound wisdom that ultimately concludes in death. so by my logic, you are only "dying" half your life, the other half, you are "living" more and more daily

 

exactly what i mean.

 

I would write it tonight, but I've got work tomorrow which means that I have to go to sleep soon.

Tomorrow is another day though. Problem with me is that my mind starts racing around 10-11 p.m. and sadly the world doesn't function on the same time frame as me.

 

At the point perhaps...but what about every other moment in time?

Lets say that point A is 1956 and that point b is 2008, and lets consider that in everyday human consciousness, there exists such a thing as time. Meet bill.

.......(bill is not alive).......A.................(Bill is alive)...............B.......(Bill is not alive)......

 

Haha, true, but there are some people with very interesting viewpoints, even if I dont agree with them. I was gonna name names, but no

I think is a very interesting idea too, if you do write the paper, I would like to read it.

 

Well, I might as well call you steve then, because obviously the fact that I have read your name is laura and the fact that everyone calls you laura...is no reason at all to assume that your name is laura. Just as the fact that I have read, observed or heard that people are born at some point in time, and then at another point in time (in a physical sense) cease to function...therefore, hey, I might as well sit here and do nothing because nothing is real and nothing I ever believed in my life was true.

I'm not saying that you can believe anything, and that you shouldn't be open to the idea of things not being as they seem, but even the most enlightened people sometimes have to rely on assumptions. Its an inevitable part of having to live and yet not being able to know everything.

 

I disagree with your idea as well.

It is impossible to trace such a "pinnacle", for all of those things are very relative and individual based. It all seems like a very strong over-simplification of a life that's much more complex than that.

Not all old people reach profound wisdom, some actually get dumber and more stubborn in their ways. Not all people loose their awareness at some point, not everyone reflects upon their knowledge, and not everyone stops gathering simple worldly knowledge which is not profound wisdom.

It is also hard to suggest that one half of your life you're "dying" and the other you are "living". Hell, it's even hard to determine which is which.

On another note, this entire thread and conversation gives me the most peculiar sense of deja-vu. I feel like I've seen this all in a dream long ago.

 

(bill is not alive).A.. (Bill is both alive and dying)..B...( Bill is not alive)

 

Sorry, you just can't convince me that a person is both alive and dying, only that they are going to die. Personally, I think they are very similar viewpoints, but you guys just want to favour the more comforting, organic perspective.

 

I'll post it here.


I think that my computer is about to commit suicide, the mouse doesn't want to work well, I think it's telling me that I should go to sleep.

 

I don't see how it's more comforting. We are dying, you are just too obsessed with the concept of time. Time doesn't rule the world, it's merely a concept.

Think of life as one day.

We are born at the beginning of the day, and we immediately begin to get closer and closer to death, we die. We grow, we get old, we get sick, we fuck up our bodies, so on and so forth, each of which is a part of death. As Aura said, life is a virus in a sense... but we also live. To live does not have to mean "not to die".

 

I dont think you have a less developed view on reality, just a more common one and Im not saying that in a derogatory way.
Me, viewing life and death as one thing and thinking that Im dying right now as I write this, didnt come with the use of psychedelics. I've felt very connected to death at a very young age, it just got way deeper after a few trips.
I feel life and death are present simultaneously, but life escapes from us, while death pulls us closers. John always says that we are born everytime we inhale and we die everytime we exhale.

 

this is another example of symbolism like in your song. what i'm saying is that in "death," or before birth, (non-existence, or non-physical existence,) we achieve profound wisdom. this wisdom is truly with the infinite part of us all of our lives, and we try to name it and understand it, and we make the mistake sometimes of thinking that it is not a part of us.

as we grow and gain knowledge and awareness (yes, not everyone does this, but artists do) we begin to understand what it truly is to live by asking questions and finding multitudes of plausable answers. but as our awareness heightens, often we begin to reach a state where we care less about the pressing questions and more about just being.... living, not asking questions as much... and though there is not necessarily an absolute pinnacle, there is a point when things more or less turn, and we listen more than we talk. we die and return to the quiet wisdom.

this is by no means my absolute belief, but i think it is another interesting idea.

about the deja vu... we are channeling so many concepts that have been said before, it's no small wonder. sometimes i'll be writing something or talking to someone and i'll literally see myself from above... and without the aid of drugs.

 

I find that is way more comforting to think that we WILL die SOMEDAY, than to think that we are dying now.

To be extremely corny: Here and now, it's all happening.