JUST A RAPHAEL MOMENT: REFLECTION ABOUT LIFE & DEATH

The News is filled with sad events. This month started with Airfrance flight 447 crashing… Although I am a very calm and balanced person, I can’t help to feel a deep sound of uncertainty in my core, unrest, and fascination about the materialistic world. I can’t keep my life simple. We are transients in this physical cycle of living, and I egress from being a Buddhist “simply human” every time I pay bills. I miss the simplicity of  Asia. I spend much energy upholding my reality in my head from being disturbed by the fact I live in a busy city. Time flows differently here.  As a kid, I thought life was only enjoyable through rebellion and stupidity. As a teen, I  understood that learning a lot would give me courage – and wisdom was powerful. As a grown-up, I aim to live preconsciously of all the aforementioned stages while showing kindness towards others… foremost aware of my own borrowed physical time.

Seriously, it’s funny how much of our media is focused on selling us ideas of how we should prolong the dying and that this inalterable fact is a horrid thing.

It all is rather simple. You co-exist in a mass that adapts to the physical and psychological environment you set yourself into. This can be limited by being jailed, drugged, or as a result of a traumatic condition. But often, even in the most constricted of living conditions, there are choices available. In our minds, we are borderless… Well, limited by how much you know about the Karman line and beyond…

Accidents happened. They don’t need a reason. Physical life can be washed away without a logical explanation. Situations can be comfortable, undeserved. Life could be challenging, against our wishes. But the choices we have before us are mostly multiple… We tend to be influenced by a need to stay young. At any age or circumstance, we readjust that boundary. We shave off some qualities and readjust. Melancholy aside, we have eery adaptability. Being alive is adjusting daily, weekly, yearly… Very banal, indeed!

Most of what caters through advertisement to us are ideas about people in “freed” condition. We distract that constant active brain with music, stories, booze, and bizarre choices throughout this living. I oddly find myself measuring a little of my success by the passing of others. At my age, often a sad story or a surprising realization that others have grown very old in parallel to my growing up. In the span of a life lived, I conclude we all make plenty of wrong choices without judgment. I took for granted my youthful invulnerability and borrowed against it and did so in a very public forum. It’s no regret. I’m here, and I’m okay!

Others in public forums, however, did struggle with similar choices. I stand in line at the store, looking at pictures of the successful young artists, idols, stars, fashionistas, sportspeople, young, beautiful, rich, glamorous, in their prime… dead. Social media flickers of people I brushed shoulders with, gone. I still listen to their music and will for years to come; I wear them printed on my shirt. They reflected in some of my actions, their words I repeat, and gestures I have copied – in how I express myself. And then I pay for my groceries, and that thought is gone: a flicker of life. A necessary awakening before transitioning into the next steps, fleeing of sorts, my mind already occupied with another thought.

To some, life is just body and party. I forgave my rebellion and stupidity. That helps me: forgiving myself, again and again. Meditate.

Some embrace a life possibly guided by a God who judges, forgives, threatens with Hell, or promises a light of Glory. It’s a huge business as well! I don’t have much understanding of such powers of wisdom. These perspectives seem complicated, unrelated, often used to “give a reason” where none is needed.

I know some don’t give a shit. That’s their way of living life. I find such peeps often lack kindness. They, however, make life very colorful. I’m glad they live around me; examples I find amusing to watch but difficult to understand.

The media is full of painful stories these days. The entertainment will never end… There are so many stars in a clear sky, beyond the limits of my sight.

Raphael