Too much cynicism on HN
Life lessons from the death bed
21–30 of 196 posts
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#22Why would I optimize my entire life for a few minutes at the end of it. That makes no sense at all.
this sounds too harsh, but I agree fully
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#23i have a weird relationship with death. Partly by choice, partly by chance, i lost the feeling of youthful invincibility pretty young and fast; i started medical school at 18 (Europe) and got my skydiving license around the same time. About 3 years later, i was deep in BASE/Skydiving and got into my role working in healthcare. Around the same time, i experienced some SERIOUS health problems for the first time. My usually tame Crohn’s turned into an ileus and months spent in the hospital. That, being confronted with mortality in healthcare plus witnessing someone go in at terminal velocity and no deployed canopy fucked me up bad. Still working on myself and the aftermath of the following existential crisis. Life is weird.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#24Nice vignettes but I don't really believe it. Not knocking those getting value out of them, but they don't work for me.
The best changes I’ve made in my life are 1. Completely removing alcohol. 2. Removing highly processed foods and refined sugars. 3. Accepting myself for who I am, faults and all. I can’t change certain things about myself, so I just need to accept that and focus on the things I can change. Maybe I can’t change them today or tomorrow, but I can always work towards future change. And the most important for me of all -…
It really is the ultimate "life hack". Free happiness: learn to enjoy what you already have.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#25People are different and so it makes sense that they'll handle death differently. Loneliness is a big problem. But I am surprised how often people fall for an anti-materialist view, yeah money's not everything, but I think its a privileged view to have. Its easy to say money is not important once you've made alot of it. I think its helpful to have some, but obv. spending all your time in its pursuit is a waste.
Money is not everything. But when you don't have it, everyone is so nasty at you. You are not allowed to have food, or shelter, or health, all those things cost money.
It shouldn't be a surprise that, as a result, many people prioritize having enough money to not have to care about not having money.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#26I wonder what she means by entering the religious life. As somebody who was raised Catholic, I don’t believe there was ever a moment where I entered that I remember. The religion was present in my life almost since birth. There were important ceremonies like the first communion and confirmation, but those happened in childhood and adolescence.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#27"Whether the house we live in is 300 or 3000 sq ft - loneliness is the same" is quite profound.
If your house is big enough you can talk to the domestic servants for company through.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#28I always struggle with balancing the advice given in pieces like this. The author suggested that they "eat their cake today" suggesting that putting off pleasure is a useless denial. Death could come for us at any moment, but I can't live like I'm dieing every day. There is just a mountain of nuance and self reflection between living some bohemian lifestyle where every moment must be filled with something and some stoic monk who has removed all want from their heart. It's too easy for me to surrender to the dopamine hits of all the things around me and find that what I actually enjoy feeling numb. Not looking for answers, I just wanted to speak for those who might struggle against filling each quiet moment with "joy" because hollow entertainment has eroded my true enjoyment more often than not.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#29woe to the ones who live their life in fear
You need to balance risk and reward. Getting to the end and telling everyone to take more risks just because you personally have nothing to lose, or the risk worked out for you, is just lotto winners telling everyone to buy lotto tickets.
Exactly. We act as if people on their death beds have some unique insight on how to live a good life. They don’t. The same thoughts will reach you if you think enough about your death while you’re alive and healthy.
Saying you can’t take you money with you (quote at the top) is a platitude. You can’t take anything with you, be it money, memories, good deeds, or consequences. You’ll be dead. You’ll lose everything equally. Your actions will no longer matter to you. They will matter to the ones left behind, but only for a little while. Eventually everyone you touched will die. Not even Jesus, Shakespeare, and Newton can survive this fate at the heat death of the Universe.
Re: Life lessons from the death bed
#30"Whether the house we live in is 300 or 3000 sq ft - loneliness is the same" is quite profound.
If your house is big enough you can talk to the domestic servants for company through.
Just because your house is big doesn't mean you have servants. And nobody is lonelier than the lonely man who is surrounded by people.