Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

>I want to see the galaxy and the universe. I want to know what it’s like to be a professional athlete. An ship captain. A state leader. A chef. I don’t want this to end.

I know that feeling. It's like getting invited to a banquet with 5000 dishes from all over and getting to pick 2 or 3.

I was always thinking: wow, if I lived a thousand years, I could spend 50 years on this thing I really like, then 50 on that thing I really like. BUT: we get one of those. And any choice means discarding all the rest. HOW DO YOU PICK?

Since our time is so limited, we need to choose wisely. Realizing that, we have avoided the terrible loss we'd feel later. So you've rediscovered what you've been hiding from and faced it - to your advantage.

A while back I realized that, even if I could buy a jet and throw hundred-dollar bills out the window, I could never visit all the amazing places on Earth for long enough to really absorb them. So hey, I might as well start visiting them on Youtube. That's going well.

Everyone on Earth is in the same boat. In fact, each one of them is very much like another you. Suppose you were reborn without any memory of the self you now call you. Would that be you? Hmmm. Anyway, 'you' would have to ... gather new memories. Make or do or experience new things.

Admitting the truth, we can focus on what's important, making things or doing things or experiencing things. Every artist, nurse, baker, fisherwoman needs an audience. I don't mind just appreciating Nature - the best inventor of them all.

Birds, deer, fish, trees, insects, they're born into a much smaller, less mobile feast. They too die. Did they even have a 'you'? Do they have the luxury of choice?

It could be wrong to say, but at times it seems like some people - even people who 'have everything' - die without having truly lived. What does that mean? We have to decide. What does it mean to live a meaningful life? What's right or wrong, who decides? Enjoy? Raise a family? Help others to a better place? Tend to the sick?

However we ask that question and make that decision and carry through ... then for sure, at the end, we'll know we've made, done, experienced what was within our reach. Time for a new you?

Your philosophy professor would recognize one of the four noble truths of Buddhism. Life has no meaning or purpose, so you can’t find any. You can try to find contentment, and it’s easier to do that by removing desire and disappointment than striving for the impossible.

You have expressed real fear and unhappiness. And lots of desires that you realize you can’t fulfill. Examine the relationship.

I know this will come off as crazy, but there is something called subjective immortality that causes us to live nearly forever but only from our personal perspective. So you'll see other people die, but you'll continue to experience only a worldline where something prevents your experience from ending.

I've started a forum to discuss the idea with others but haven't got very far. Still if you have any questions or want to find links to more information it's at https://immortalityforum.com/forum/

I just fantasize and hope we discover a way to make people immortal and by that time I will have enough funds to buy in.