by Andy Mckendry

Created on: April 22, 2008   Last Updated: August 30, 2010

The concept of an afterlife is as aged as the earth itself. Every religious sect, people group, and individual has their own interpretation of what exists after this life. The idea of a celestial existence is a comforting thought. Death is the inexplicable, the one thing none of us may escape. In this there is a real fear. Humankind is afraid of the unknown. We can have only faith in the existence of an afterlife, we can only interpret and evaluate the possibilities. Here it degenerates into our survival instinct. We cannot perceive death as the end. Our mortality is at stake.

I recently read an article of a writer who traveled to Dachau. In this place of death he felt nothing. It was a cold day on his arrival and he pondered the irony that his heart felt more numb than his exterior. He reported a sensation of detachment. The atrocities that this place had harbored were too extreme for his comprehension. Perhaps, the setting was too reminiscent of his own precarious existence. This writer also recalled that as a child his bedroom window had overlooked a graveyard. His curtains remained shut. Those solitary markers of the dead were a more frightening reminder of his mortality than the cold of this new experience.

However, this life according to some, is simply preparation for our next reality. Our quality of existence, our actions, the interactions we have, are all integral to where we will exist in the hierarchy of the next life. Whether we are reincarnated, or journeying to paradise, the way we choose to live this life is important.

Here, the problems arise. If we mistakenly choose our preference of the afterlife then all our striving, searching, pondering, and questions we ask, the good we feel we have done, the people who's lives we have altered, will all be ultimately futile. In fact, there is more than just achieving paradise here, for if we are wrong, and this existence has been futile, then we may discover that the afterlife is one of torment.

There is, however, another possibility. One that at first appears frightening. When we vacate this mortal coil, there may only be nothingness. This is not a state of being we will experience. Perhaps, this is a more comforting ideology. It allows for freedom in this, the only plane of existence.

However, in the western, capitalist world we have the luxury of enjoying this life. There is nothing we are truly lacking. We can debate this issue, and we, who are lucky, can decide where we want to end up. In a setting where life is difficult, time to pause is nonexistent, where everything is a constant struggle, then the idea of a heavenly, comfortable, luxurious, finale is tempting. This must give so many people the hope to continue, the dream of resting and existing in peace and happiness.

If the interpretation of the afterlife is one of nothingness, and if the individual is truly content with that judgment, then death is no more of an issue than for those who adhere to a religious existence after death. The peace at the final breath must be found in the life that they are leaving. A life of achievement, a life that you are proud of, will give you the ability to accept death and not fear.

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