A Short Piece on Death and Morbidness

I had an interesting experience a while ago, and it was similar to many that I had had before, but now I think I understand it a bit better:

I was going about my daily routine, not really focusing too much on the environment around me as I was absorbed in my inner thoughts, when I suddenly waved my hand before my face; I stopped and actually paid attention to it (for how often do you look at your hand and really think about it at the same time? not that often, right?). And it was very weird, because the longer I looked at my hand, the clearer it seemed to come into focus, and the more I thought about it, the slower time seemed to be passing. On that note, have any of you noticed how time flies by so quickly most of the time? And how when we were little, it almost dragged? Well, anyways, so I was looking at my hand, and then I took the time to look around; I examined the tiny etchings in bark and the patterns on a leaf, etc. In that moment when I wasn't absorbed in my own thoughts, I felt very much like a hunk of flesh, with life beating within that will eventually be extinguished; somehow, when we're immersed in our own minds, death becomes something like the background to all of our trivial thoughts, pain, emotion. We're so busy worrying about some test coming up that we seem to almost forget it (death), and in forgetting death, we lose the value of living. It was a very weird experience, but looking at the freckles on the hand that will someday have no function, I felt very terrified, for the first time, of death. Has there ever been a moment, perhaps on a really bad day, when you think to yourself, "Oh, I'm not afraid of death at all," when really it's just because you're bothering yourself with some trivial inconvenience that is equal on no scale to the horror of death. Seriously, examining death from the point of view of any religion is not a happy activity; take Christianity - you die, you go to Heaven, your loved ones go to Heaven, but relationships and simple being are not supposed to be the same as they are here; so along with a Christian's fear of death would come the fear of the unknown, fear of what is only vaguely described. Now, take Buddhism (or any other religion that favors the theory of reincarnation) - you die, you forget everything you ever knew, and you are born again into a new life (as another person, a squirrel, a tree) until some decisive point when the higher power allows you to pass into a Nirvana (which only applies to some reincarnational beliefs). Notice what I italicized: what is the point of anything we learn, any relationships we develop with others, if they are to be forgotten in the next life - why should we feel triumph when we learn from our mistakes when it is likely that we will make the same mistakes again? Personally, I'm very sentimental, and I cannot stand the thought of parting with my memories, with the love I have felt for people that makes me feel the most alive in my current life. Next, take Nature-ism (can't remember the real word; basically anyone who believes that we are a part of a natural cycle and share a sort of life-death relationship with nature); you die, your soul and being recede into and nourish nature (you become part of a tree or blade of grass), and you follow the natural cycle of nature (you grow, you die, you decompose, you become part of a flower or some other plant). I don't think I need to explain what is so frightening about the idea of existing in tree-form when we've become so used to this human thing. And last, look through the eyes of the aetheist (or pessimistic agnostic); you die, your soul (if you have one) does not go elsewhere, you rot (or sit in an urn somewhere). I don't think that many people want to believe in this, because it is quite depressing; as with reincarnation, there is the same feeling of unimportance if there is no life after this - what is the point of making relationships, loving, feeling happiness, if we're all just going to rot in the end? But anyways, if I just offended anyone with the above examination of death through several perspectives, please forgive me and I'll try not to do it again. My point, however, is that whatever anyone might say, death is a scary thing, and the best way to cherish this life (before we change in being, forget everthing, turn into a tree, or rot) is to go back to our roots and make use of the little-kid philosophy: carpe diem (or seize the day) - seize it, squeeze it, milk it for the gazillion it is worth, because whatever you believe in, you only get this day once, this hour, this minute, and your hand will never look the same against the wood of the desk as it does now. So live and do it now : )