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Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#51

Post by p0d »

anonymouse71 wrote: post #30
xupybd wrote: post #23

I'm Christian and have very deep beliefs in life after this. They bring some comfort to me on this topic. However in reading your words I suspect such a belief would not bring much comfort. I think you may have some anxiety issues that could be worth addressing. Regardless of your personal beliefs there is next to nothing you can do to preserve this life beyond the brief existence you're currently enjoying. That's a…

Thank you. Yeah HN didn’t let me put everything I wrote in the post so I see a lot of people are seeing only the third that made it into the post and not the main parts. Definitely anxiety. Definitely need to address that regardless. Unlikely that I’ll go back to religion as to me it rings false. Not trying to invalidate anyone else, just have enough experience with my brain to know that I can spend my life believing…

I am also a christian and went through a phase similar to yourself. If not shorter and possibly less intense. A cloud would come over my head for a time and I worried that one day it would stay.

I think my fear of death stemmed from being part of a loving family for the first time in my life. This churned up emotions inside of me that I had never had before. The fear of being separated from people who loved me was new. It took some time and discussion for me to realise that these feelings were entirely normal. It became a matter of what I chose to do with these thoughts and feelings.

As the response above suggests you should speak to an expert. Hopefully they will help you break out of the rut you are getting yourself into. The common sense part of me recommends you focus on today, then tomorrow, then the day after. At 50 I focus on Jesus's teaching of not unnecessarily worrying about tomorrow. My prayer is often, "God give me the wisdom I need for today". This prayer follows years of trying to anticipate the future and being confused by much of the "be awesome" tat we read online.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#52

Post by morlockabove »

You don't want to die from something as stupid as aging. Fair enough. Neither do I.

Lots of people advocate trying to make peace, or ignore the train running down to where you're tied on the tracks. Might have been the best move anytime before a few centuries ago. Now, though? We might have medicine good enough to halt aging within the next few generations. You might be too late to save yourself, but you might be able to save your kids. So donate money to anti-aging organisations, or change your job- use your resources in the most efficient way you can figure out to help on the task of solving the problem. Long term, that's the only solution. Even if it's too late to get yourself to 'longevity escape velocity', being one of the million cuts that beats back death seems worthwhile.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#53

Post by morlockabove »

giantg2 wrote: post #3

Sounds like you should talk to a therapist. If you let your fear cripple you, then you can't do anything with your life anyways. So that level of fear is not logical. Just accept your death - we are all going to die.

I think one problem is that wanting to not die seems fucking logical. No less logical than any other want, anyway. If you don't have to justify pullimg your hand out of a fire, I think you don't have to justify an aversion to non-existence.

All the arguments about it actually being okay make me suspicious that they're a coping mechanism, from people who wouldn't actually choose physical degeneration, pain, and death if they had the choice a priori. (who would?)

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#54

Post by morlockabove »

anonymouse71 wrote: post #2

I am well aware that with the state of the world and the winter’s short days are clearly affecting my reactions to these thoughts. I know that and am taking steps to try to fix my brain chemistry. I have an appointment with my primary care coming up where I plan to discuss changes to my medications that might help make me not panic. But ultimately I am not after simply being calm as I get older and closer to death. T…

>What good is it to live a trillion trillion years just to freeze to death while starving?

It's 10 billion trillion times better than living 100 years and then dying while hacking your lungs out delirious in a hosipital bed covered in bedsores. Potentially a lot more, if there's prospects to alter/expand ourselves into being capable of contemplating/experiencing more complicated ideas and scenarios beyond the scope of our current bodies.

It just seems like making the best of a bad situation. If I imagine two futures, one where people get old and decrepit, live in terrible pain, and die at 80, for such a stupid reason as that they're produced by a blind-idiot-god process that doesn't need them as more than a disposable fuck/murderbot. And this keeps happening till an asteroid hits and they all die.

And another where they never have to go away and can explore the furthest reaches of what they can be, until, eventually, after an incredible amount of time, we have a last mournful party and turn off the lights across the cosmos.

The second story's sad! But not as sad and ugly as the first, and it might make life coming into being have been worth it, on balance.

I heard someone say, once, that the growth of humanity could grant us purer, more complete, and more perfect death than nature alone would deign to give us.

I'd rather die with an eon of friends at my side, having lived a few millenia as a walrus, than practically stillborn here and now.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#55

Post by newusertoday »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #49
newusertoday wrote: post #45

do you go to sleep everyday? do you like to goto sleep? don't you "cease" to exist in sleep everyday? is that an unpleasant experience? if not think of death as sleeping it would stop bothering you.

Sleep is the worst for me. All the ugly, bad dreams that terrify me. If death was anything like that, I am going to hell.

interesting, i was talkig about deep sleep, duration without dream where we sort of cease to exist. In dream state you are again present, so it is more like real life than death.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#56

Post by anotheryou »

I'm an atheist and fear the void, but not a lot.

However I believe strongly that everything has a cause and be it randomness or pseudorandom once it started it made sense how it kept going. If I made a wrong decision it was still the only thing that could have happened. ANd probably it was even the best choice at the time.

I don't know how to change as a person, but for me it's like this:

I'm OK with being average in some ways and I don't have to be remembered either. I enjoy life while it lasts, I don't have big plans, I don't collect many keepsakes. I simply optimize for being a decent being and enjoying life (life of course washes you elsewhere sometimes).

If I die tomorrow it will be a bit short, but I had a good run I guess. I try not to waste thoughts on things I can't influence.

In the end nobody wants to die, it's a always a tragedy and even fear might get to me, but as long as I have no reason to believe my end is near I'll be fine.

About the aging body: I'm fine as long as I don't have too much pain and I'm still sharp in the mind. For pain: I guess morphine will do in the worst case, so that's a solved issue. For a deteriorating mind: I hope there will be a cure against alzheimers, but if it's coming I might plan an exit strategy and try to execute it while I still can.

The only thing that does bother me a lot: pissing a way my life with a full time job. But even that: has to be right now, can change, I'm working towards that.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#57

Post by giantg2 »

morlockabove wrote: post #53
giantg2 wrote: post #3

Sounds like you should talk to a therapist. If you let your fear cripple you, then you can't do anything with your life anyways. So that level of fear is not logical. Just accept your death - we are all going to die.

I think one problem is that wanting to not die seems fucking logical. No less logical than any other want, anyway. If you don't have to justify pullimg your hand out of a fire, I think you don't have to justify an aversion to non-existence. All the arguments about it actually being okay make me suspicious that they're a coping mechanism, from people who wouldn't actually choose physical degeneration, pain, and death…

I generally agree with what you are saying, but you missed my point about it interfering with living. If you're so afraid of death that you lock yourself in a room instead of doing the things you want, then what's the point of living. The OP says the fear he has is interfering with things he wants to do in life. What's the point of extending life if you don't get to live it?

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#59

Post by skrooge »

For panic attacks there are meds. They help a lot to feel calm. Panic attacks or constant fear doesn't help you in life, they prevent you from living. Ask for meds, they help a lot if you struggle with anxiety disorder.

The perspective you have may change, I've seen a 105 year old talking he was so tired of life. If you are in constant pain, or horrible situation, life suddenly isn't so great.

Life is great when you are young, so enjoy it. The future doesn't exist yet, so don't overthink it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with your mortality?

#60

Post by Viliam1234 »

auxpart wrote: post #46

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 wa…

The bad news is that living forever doesn't necessarily mean living an enjoyable life. Religions have the idea of living forever in hell. Any system that has the possibility of living forever, includes the possibility of hell.
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