“The Grace In Dying” by Kathleen Dowling Singh is a novel that combines the views of transpersonal psychology, personal experiences, alongside her Buddhist practices and believes on death, that so many people choose to ignore due to its overpowering fear. With these she is able to produce a novel where she differentiates and explains the faint stages of transformation in the transpersonal, spiritual, psychological, philosophical, energetic and physiological experiences of a person going through a near death experience.
The book offers a very orthodox Buddhist image to advocate the experience of death as if it were like, “an empty vase in which the space inside is exactly the same as the space outside. Only the fragile walls of the vase separate
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However, this didn’t make this book less impactful or informative, in fact it made it a lot more straightforward and realistic. I really enjoyed the connections the book had with Buddhist believes of Samsara and especially re-incarnation. My favourite and most poignant part of the novel, had to be the constant reassurance that dying is safe. From the start Singh writes, “Dying is safe. You are safe. Your loved one is safe. That is the message of all the words here.” As a teenager, I’m constantly told to, “Live life to the fullest,” and “life is too short, so make the most out of it,” and that creates a frightening response to any thought of death. We are all humans, and as humans we will do anything to “save” our lives, so thinking about the end of our existence, creates an automatic negative feeling. This book however, really opened the door that I’ve been trying to keep closed for years, the thought of death. During the novel, Singh keeps reminding us that dying is just returning to the place from where we first came from, and the thought of that really changed my whole perspective on this sensitive
The Frontline special on Being Mortal, written by Atul Gawande, shows the difficult side of healthcare that many doctors struggle with, how to confront death with patients. He brings light to topics like terminal illness and facing mortality. Atul Gawande is an oncologist whom, like many doctors, still wonders how to tell patients that their treatment is no longer working. He decided to collaborate with different physicians to gain a better understanding of how to approach the situation.
Of the eleven options to read or watch for the paper, I chose to read, the Autobiography of Malcolm X, and Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. The first choice, Autobiography of Malcolm X, was my first choice because it was a book that was a topic in high school history classes and I wanted to gain a better understanding of the book and actually read the book in its entirety. Siddhartha was also a topic when learning the Indian culture and religion in high school history classes so when this was an option given to read, I took advantage of that and read this to concentrate for the assignment. I chose these two books because both covered a different element of life that still affect me and society today. Not only was the time each book had been written
Women are the society’s backbone In A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines, three women take care of not only themselves but others. These three women are Tante Lou, Miss Emma and Vivian. Tante Lou is the woman who raises Grant when his mother ran off. Miss Emma is Jefferson’s godmother and she cares for him a lot.
“Solving the Riddle of Near-Death Experiences,” was written by Gideon Lichfield. The studies that were conducted in the article are from 1975 to present. Most of the information the author received was from an annual conference of the International Association for Near-Death Studies in Newport Beach, California. The author wanted to find out what makes a person start believing he has truly seen the other side, and is there a scientific way to know what’s really going on? Lichfield analyzed the perspective of the individuals who have had near death experiences and scientific studies done on the subject.
As mentioned there is a division of fear or hostility when it comes to any form of ‘House of God’. When it comes to a church many Americans are happy to have one in their neighborhood but unfortunately when it comes to a mosque or temple or even a synagogue these are met with more resistance, “Almost everyone is okay with a Christian Church in their neighborhood; highly religious Americans are less sure about a Buddhist temple” (Putnam and Campbell, p514-515). Does this make them less tolerant? Or is this about fear and instability? This is where I see that Putnam and Campbell have not answered the question of whether America is as liberal or even as tolerant as one would like to believe.
“We can’t heal the world today but we can begin with a voice of compassion, a heart of love, and an act of kindness.” This quote by Mary Davis encapsulates the essence of Gaines’ lesson on humanity in “A Lesson Before Dying,” emphasizing the crucial role of embracing each other with love and support to cultivate an improved society that is united. In the face of Jefferson’s oppressive circumstances and impending death sentence, Grant’s community urges him to guide Jefferson towards manhood, after Jefferson was called a hog, a responsibility initially resisted. However, as Grant reluctantly teaches Jefferson, a bond forms between them, leading to mature growth that inspire one another and the rest of the community. Gaines highlights the profound
Magical thinking is the anthropological idea that if one performs the right actions, or hopes enough for something, their desired outcome will happen. The concept of “magical thinking” is one of the central ideas discussed in Joan Didion’s memoir The Year of Magical Thinking. This memoir explores the grief experienced by the author after losing her husband of nearly forty years. In no way does Didion try to approach death poetically, but rather honestly and practically. She bravely discusses the universal, yet rarely talked about, aspects of death, such as self pity, regret, isolation, secretly going crazy, and the phenomenon she describes as “magical thinking.”
Near death, experiences allow for an individual in
“Death” Mini-Essay Thomas Nagel’s “Death” has a central theme that is addressed. Nagel explores the idea that if death is a lasting and permanent end to our lives on earth, it could be bad. Nagel uses this theme and goes on to give two possible arguments. In the first argument, Nagel explains that life is all we really have in the end and because death puts an end to our life, it must be our greatest loss in life. The second position he takes is that the person who actually dies will not experience any loss whether it is positive or negative because death will end that person’s life and their existence anyway.
Understandably, the inevitable idea of death is feared by many myself included, however that is exactly why it is important to realize that we need to appreciate every moment we go through, even the bad ones because without that, life would have no meaning to it. The biggest mistake one can make is thinking life has a monetary value. Amanda Ripley’s article What Is a Life Worth? Explains how the
Everyone knows that death is inevitable, yet strangely, when the subject of death emerges, fear is evident in people’s faces and tone of voice. When deeply examining works of art, such as Gladiator, Myths to Live By, and world tragedies such as the horrific event that took place on September 11, 2001, the reality of death is a prime focus of human culture. Death is an event that everyone in the world will endure; however, human beings can’t live in fear with the thought of one day staring death in its face. Joseph Campbell focuses on the aspect of life that frightens people the most: death. The straightforwardness of “The Emergence of Mankind” motivates people to think about the phenomenon of death itself.
From the film, one can learn that death and dying affects not only
Introduction Alzheimer’s is a chronic neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and gets worse over time. The most common early symptom is difficulty in remembering recent events or short memory loss. As the disease advances, symptoms can include difficulty with language, disorientation, mood swing and behavior problems. As a person 's condition progressed, they often withdraw from friends and family. Slowly, bodily functions deteriorated and eventually death occurs.
It is not everyday that a human being is offered another chance at life after death. Mo Yan’s protagonist, Ximen Nao, of the novel Life and Death are Wearing Me Out, experiences a day unlike any other when he receives a blessing to return to earth after having faced bloody execution; his return to the world of the living, however, did not go as intended. With every tantalizing offer, there existed a set of terms and conditions. Without awareness of the aforementioned terms, Ximen Nao cursed himself with the blessing he received. This novel tugs at readers’ senses of morality and of perspective.
There has been a recent shift in the desire to understand what happens after death, and the increase in occurrence of near-death experiences 's (NDE 's) have acted as miniature victories for philosophers and researchers world-wide. It is theorized that if an understanding of what occurs at