Death - the Ultimate Teacher
Almost all traditions have tried to conquer death, to outlive death. For some reason, all of us want to experience immortality. Only one group of really intelligent and intuitive people understood after much struggle that we were approaching death in a completely wrong manner. They decided to take a hundred and eighty degree turn. They started working with death in a different way. They used meditation as a technique to take them where others had not dared to go before. Those few intelligent ones were the rishis (sages) of the Upanishad age. The report that they submitted on their research into the phenomenon of death is called the Katopanishad.
Of course, I am presenting the ultimate truth. It is the truth of the struggle of the whole of humanity. It is the history of almost the whole of human consciousness. We are all familiar with the history of humanity. I am presenting the history of human consciousness. These rishis did research on death and finally came to the conclusion that death cannot be understood or overcome by resistance. By resisting death, we cannot go beyond death. The only way to break free of the vicious cycle of birth and death was by becoming enlightened. Entering into the death experience, penetrating death, dropping fear was the key to understanding death.
The main character of the Katopanishad is a small boy called Nachiketa. He meets death and faces it eye to eye, without fear. The beauty of the Upanishad is that for the first and last time, death is depicted as a hero. Death is portrayed as the Lord and Master, as God and Guru. It is God who gives all the boons it is and the Guru who gives wisdom or the ultimate intelligence. When the boy faced death squarely, without any prejudice, Yama, the Lord of Death, became the giver of material boons and the ultimate wisdom rather than the taker of life.
We may wonder, how can death give one all these things? Try to comprehend this in a different dimension, in a different way. As long as we are afraid, we will never look death in the eye. Unless and until we do that, we will never know how blessed we are with abundance. It is only when we lose something that we realize the value of that thing. Just meditate on this. Suppose you are going to die in two days, what are the things that you would want to do? How much would there be to finish? It is only when we take stock of our life that we understand how much of goodness is showered on us. We take everything for granted because we believe that we are going to live forever.
Albert Einstein says, 'There are two ways to live one's life: one is as though nothing is a miracle and the other is as though everything is a miracle!'
Only when we understand death, will we understand the preciousness of life. Once we face death without fear, we will understand that death is not the end of life but the climax. When this understanding dawns on us, we will stop praying for everlasting life.
We pray only when the question of death arises. I have seen so many atheists crying out the names of all the Gods the moment the doctor declares that they are going to die! Immediately, they turn to God for help. There are so many politicians who have come to me secretly asking for healing or for vibhuti (holy ash). To the world at large, they are great atheists but in their homes they worship out of sheer fear.
Then there are philosophers and the vedantins (followers of *Vedanta* philosophy). Just because they read a lot, they begin to think that they have become enlightened. No amount of reading can give one the experience of the written words. If we digest the food that we eat, it is transformed into energy that can be utilized in our life. If we don't digest our food properly, what happens? Our system gets disturbed and we vomit the undigested food. In the same way, if we meditate on intellectual ideas, on great philosophy, Vedanta, it will become our experience. If we don't meditate, we misunderstand these great truths, catch hold of people, and start vomiting on them. We will start preaching to them!
Both, our greed and our fear can be transformed by meditation. No other technique can do that which meditation can; not even prayer. Praying is just another method of escapism. Never pray out of fear. I have seen many people who start chanting the Lord's name, saying some prayer or the other, when they are walking alone on a deserted road. We remember God only when we are alone or when we are frightened. We feel good because our mind gets diverted. We don't remember the fear. We do not dwell in the fear. When we pray, our mind gets diverted and we feel things are fine. Don't think that your favorite God has come to help you. Even if one chants, 'Coca -Cola, Coca-Cola, Coca-Cola,' one's mind will be diverted! One will not experience fear. But that is not the way to face fear. That is not the way to overcome fear.
The only way to overcome fear is to face it! Only then will we understand that death has no value. It is only we who give so much of importance to death. Please understand that death has power over us only because of our belief, our faith in it. It is just a matter of belief.
When we believe that death is terrifying, it becomes terrifying. It is like a mirror that faithfully reflects whatever we project on it. When a donkey sees itself in the mirror, what will it see? It will see a donkey, nothing else. Can it see anything else? In the same way, if we are totally afraid of death, then we will see only fear reflected back to us.