Woody Allen famously said that he didn't want to achieve
immortality through his work; he wanted to achieve it through not dying. While
we celebrate birth, its corollary, exiting the Earth plane, is feared only
slightly less than public speaking — at least, in the Western mind.
As someone with a gerontology (study of aging) background
and an abiding love of elders, I've been exploring positive aging and
death-related subject matter for years. I'm currently reading two complementary
books with mirrored titled:
From Age-ing to Sage-ing by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, and Sage-ing
While Age-ing by Shirley MacLaine.
MacLaine's book has been eye opening, not least because she articulates much
that I've discovered/remembered on my own awakening journey, but also because
she ratchets up my knowledge to the next level. In Chapter 11 (number of
Aquarius), she focuses on soul development and references the work of
regression therapist Michael
Newton, PhD.
Suddenly I read, "All regressed souls speak of how much
easier death is than birth. With death there is a release into the light.
With birth there is an entrance into density." Of course! It's easier to expand
than to contract.
And this awareness dovetails beautifully with another
stunning book I read last year, Deathing: An Intelligent Alternative for the
Final Moments of Life by Anya Foos-Graber.
Deathing is the
real deal on conscious departure. We're not meant to die alone and afraid,
maintains Foos-Graber. This definitive guide — the first of its kind I've seen,
and it was published in 1989 — spells out clearly how each person can prepare
for an informed death. Since most of us avoid any discussion of the subject,
the very concept of a 'how-to' manual may sound frightening. Yet like MacLaine,
Foos-Graber maintains that death can be a light-filled, spiritual experience.
We have a lot of help entering the world: we emerge from
the body of our mother with attendants such as doctors, nurses, midwives,
spouses and friends at the ready to welcome us and tend to the birthing mother.
But there is no corresponding death ritual to support us in exiting the body
we've inhabited as we return to the Great Mother of All.
Through two teaching stories, Foos-Graber shows us what
both a typical, unconscious dying and a planned 'deathing' experience look
like. The second half of the book provides step-by-step instructions and simple
exercises such as breathing, visualization and remembering the Love that you
are, to assist you in releasing the body and making a conscious, even joyful,
departure from this life — and to support others in doing so.
Plus, we can rehearse while alive! Foos-Graber writes,
"By practicing ahead of time with an eye toward this spiritual life
insurance, you can increasingly live in an atmosphere free from fear and
ignorance. A correct grasp of how to die necessarily produces an expanded
philosophy of how to live more abundantly, however long or short your time of
physical life."
As I was reading this book, a friend of mine's husband
surrendered to cancer. Here's how she described his conscious death: "He
squeezed my hand and left his breath here to begin to inhale the ethers of
elsewhere. A gentle wave of joyful contentment spread out in ripples of
sparkling delight. He was free again and slowly twirling in the softly glowing
wonder of it all. This ethereal mist of farewell whispered through our home for
an hour or so and then was gone."
So let us bow to that elephant and embrace its wisdom,
rather than indulge in what MacLaine refers to as "amphysteria" ~ a
condition of forgotten fear, usually of a place. We have no reason to fear
expansion into the Light of All. And the elephant-headed Hindu deity Ganesh is
revered as the "Remover of Obstacles". We can ride the elephant of
awareness right on into the next adventure.
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