Writing About Fear, Death, And Immortality
By Uka Battulga
Since time immemorial human beings have recorded, observed, feared, and accepted the inevitable– death. Due to our inability to escape the impending afterlife, we have been determined to survive as long as possible and to postpone any encounters with divine beings by means of advanced science, avant garde machinery and state of the art technology whereby we find exceedingly valuable to our overall health.
We even have a word that means fear of death, Thanatophobia.
On the other there is no word that means “fear of immortality.” How can such a word exist when the human race itself is not eternal?
We fear the cease of life because somewhere tucked in the back of our minds, we realize that once we surrender our last breath, we will wander into the unknown; a territory where all thoughts and existence and consciousness terminate.
Despite all of this enchilada about death and nothingness, what if it were possible for us to live eternally? Let’s say, in an improbable world, individuals were given two options: 1) to live a natural life of which death is expected or 2) permanent presence on earth.
Only the foolish or audacious would choose the latter.
Immortality is the defying of the natural cycle of creation and destruction. Thus, within a world of interminable revision and revolution, immortal beings would witness it all, births and deaths and world-changing events. And when the foreordained occasion happens, the world will turn into a churning cyclone of entropy. Will the immortal beings survive an apocalypse? The end of the world? The universe?
I have mentioned two extremes: death and immortality (where one is obviously inevitable and the other impossible). The point I am trying to make is this, humans are on this planet for a short period of time. Amid the rush of the seasons, the flickering of birthday candles and the scramble of daily life, we must stretch our time on earth, not by elongation or breadth, but rather by the depth of which we dive– because the excitement is below the surface.
May our curiosity lead us to extraordinary places. May our excitement tickle our love for terrific and terrifying heights. May our lives allow us to live.