My Afternoon with Life & Death

On Thursday I had the most profound experience of my life. I don’t know how to quantify this into words. So I will just recount the events as they happened.

I was tripping on shrooms.

I was laying in the backyard late afternoon, staring at the blue sky and watching the palm trees sway back and forth in the wind. A chubby little bird landed on the palm tree’s branch. It had black feathers and a yellow belly. It was small and quick. And it was just pecking around, every movement so abrupt like it was living on its own time fractional to mine. 

I laid there and wished I had the perspective of the bird. 

I would be able to see everything. I would take off flying whenever I wanted, and sing from the top of my lungs on the highest branches of trees. 

But then I realized if I had the perspective of the bird, the only things I could think about would be: food, sex and not get killed.

Not great.

I actually wanted to have the perspective of me but in the bird’s body.

I laughed at how beautiful mind is.

I closed my eyes and began feeling the wind on my skin. Where does wind come from? Well, it comes from the difference in atmospheric — shhh. It doesn’t matter where wind comes from. It only matters that it’s here and I can feel it. 

Shut up.

I smiled at how beautiful being alive is.

Then I experienced this feeling of free fall. It was deep and it was unnerving. Like on TV when they have those scenes of a tunnel loop before transitioning into a completely different time and space. 

Except it didn’t last a second. It went on and on. Things and people flashed before me as I continued falling: Dan Koe, Thich Nhat Hanh, the beach, my best friend, Twitter, my mom.

I laid there as my body felt extremely heavy. As if I was being stepped on by a giant and slowly sinking into the earth. But not in a bad way. Just a feeling. No more or less than feeling happy, sad, or heart broken.

When I finally opened my eyes, I was back under the same blue sky. I watched the palm tree sway back and forth. The heaviness was lifted.

What is the point? — I heard myself saying over and over.

When Thich Nhat Hanh passed away, it was really sad. And anyone who knew him would say, by default, that the world had borne a huge loss. That he had done so much for mankind. 

But did anything really change? My friend’s life doesn’t change. My parent’s life doesn’t change. And neither does yours.

What about Dan Koe? Or Elon Musk? What if they died tomorrow? 

Same thing.

What is the point of any of their existence? Or mine?

If Thomas Edison didn’t invent electricity, somebody else would.

Even if there was no electricity, human experience would be different but the cycle stays the same.

Life is stubborn that way.

I started feeling extremely uncomfortable. I could feel my ego trying to grasp onto its reality — its self-importance.

Because if there isn’t any point…

What if I just sit in my bed tomorrow and eat frozen chicken pot pie and watch meaningless TV until my money runs out? Until I am evicted? Until I am sitting on a park bench somewhere? Until I starve to death?

Would there be a point then? No.

And on the contrary, if I had achieved everything I wanted, if I had millions of dollars in my bank and I’m recognized by the world for being the funniest narcissist — would anything be different?

The way I live my life might be different, but the way you live yours stays the same.

And when I die, life would move on all the same.

I couldn’t find a single good reason that tells me I shouldn’t just sit in my bed and eat chicken pot pie until my death. That really messed me up.

The idea that I wake up at 5, work out, write, read or do anything to account for nothing in the end felt insufferable. 

I started free falling again.

I closed my eyes and this time my thoughts dissolved. I was no longer thinking. I was feeling them. 

I was feeling the meaninglessness of my life.

If I laid there forever until I turned into a tree, life would go on.

If my parents, partner and goddaughter died, life would go on.

I felt myself and everything I’ve ever known as a grain of sand in an infinite ocean.

All of a sudden, I stopped feeling bad. I stopped free falling.

I felt the ocean. I felt the cliff I was standing on. I felt a wind particle traversing the clear blue sky but not separate from it. I felt the trees sprouting and growing like I was inside a time lapse.

I felt life with a complete absence of self. I wasn’t aware of anyone I know. Not even my mom — someone who always occupied my mind and triggered an immense feeling of guilt in my previous trips.

I had no self. 

And I felt an immense wave of bliss.

I felt bliss the same way the waves hit its shore day after day whether someone is looking or not.

The same way a storm stirs up the ocean until it wears itself out and allows her a restful sleep the next day.

It didn’t matter if I had 1 follower or 1M. If I succeeded or turned into a potato-eating beach hobo. If I died or everyone I knew did. If humans went extinct.

You see.. no matter how badly you mess up…. 

The most beautiful things in life WOULD go on. 

And what’s so bad about death? It’s nothing but a natural process of life. If there is no death, there wouldn’t be any life.

Yet somehow, we tell ourselves we are of the highest consciousness, and we are the species that deserves to cheat death.

So we spend every waking moment of our life trying cheat death we end up dying over and over again every single day.

Do you see the irony in this?

We settle into lives that aren’t our own.

We give up half of our waking life to a soul sucking job.

We confine ourselves in walls of limitations that rob us the feeling of being alive.

All so we don’t run out of money and prolong a lifeless existence as long as we can.

What if we lived in a society where people say congratulations instead of sorry for your loss when our loved ones die? What if we celebrated death? How free would we be then?

Here is my takeaway from all of this.

Meaninglessness isn’t scary to you.

It’s scary to your ego who wants to be the center of the universe.

But what you should actually be scared of is living in servant of said ego and constantly operating out of fear — fear of being alone, fear of not keeping up with people, fear of dying an unimportant death.

This fear will keep you chasing more and more things to protect itself, whether materialistic or abstract, until your days run out.

All of our lives are meaningless and it’s the most beautiful thing.

We are nothing but a grain of sand in an infinite ocean and yet we have the consciousness to experience it all.

The meaninglessness of life allows you to do anything you want and live life completely how you see it.

It allows you the ultimate freedom to choose what responsibilities exist in your life, what purpose you should pursue and who should stay in it.

It’s not you who is searching for the meaning of life.

It’s you who creates it.

So yeah, I had a wild afternoon. 

If you’ve read this far, I’m really curious what you think about all of this. 

How do you view death? What is the meaning of life? Let me know. 

If you can, click here to clap for my ego (I never said it was gone permanently)

Until next time,

Ciao ❤️