*new* one week after the Boston Marathon Bombing
A Salon.com retrospective
http://www.salon.com/2013/04/20/across_america_a_week_of_chaos_horror___and_hope/
What do you think after our course? Use the last chapters of both books as well as other course materials and discussions.
I think death puts my life into perspective. Alot of the time I forget that I myself have an experation date and that one day I'm going to die. It in a way reminds me of my own mortality and makes me want to appreciate the moments and time I still have left. Though It's not a feeling that stays with me because after a month or so I'll be back to taking life for granted. It also makes me reflect on the things i've already done and that in itself is a bitter sweet feeling. Death shows me that I have a weakness or a flaw and that is that I can only exist here on this earth for so much time. Everyone likes to feel like they have so much life ahead of them still and even now as we age we've found new ways of trying to turn bacck the clocks through cosmetic products and surgeries. But then again, what value would my life hold if I knew I was to exist forever? I would have an infinite amount of time to do anything I want. Life would seem boring after a certain point, "well i've been there and i've done that already", what else would I have to do with myself If I exist forever and I've already completed all of the things I've ever wanted to do? The world as we know it is shrinking before our eyes and being stuck on this sphere of dirt and water is not my idea of fun. We as humans wish to graduate from this life to something better. So yes, death increases the value of life in my eyes. We are opted to enjoy things more, live larger, dream bigger and work harder because we no that we only have one chance. One life that is unique to each individual and when it's gone it cannot return.
ReplyDeleteAfter all that I have learned from this course, I have learned to cherish life. You have no idea when life can be taken from you, and that is a scary thought. But within this course, we learn to not be afraid of death because it is just another part of life. We should enjoy the life we have to live right now as much as possible because none of us know when our time could be up. I also enjoyed all of our class discussions. Interacting with another is a lot more fun than just listening to lecture.
ReplyDeleteAfter taking this course I would have to say that death does give life meaning. We live so that one day we can die. Therefore, I have learned to live my life to the fullest, that I do not regret anything in my life, and if I were to die tomorrow of course I would not like that to happen, but I would have lived my life the way that I would have wanted to. In addition, I have confronted the thought of my death and I realize I am not afraid of dying, but that I am afraid of it being painful. So, I am greatful for what medicine can do for us when we die to make it as easy as possible.
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ReplyDeleteI didn’t really think much about death before this class. It was always some far off event that I didn’t have to worry about for some years. But now considering all that we have discussed in class, I do think that death gives life meaning. To me our purpose in life is to live authentically and try our best to always do the right thing so that we can earn eternal life in Heaven. The goal is to get to Heaven after we die. Without death we would not have this type of goal plus we would lose some meaning to life. If we never died people would lose sight of their true purpose in life and not value suffering or the meaning significant events in their life. People take their lives for granted and do not see the meaning in life. However, death puts your time spent on Earth into perspective since you are only here for a relatively short amount of time to make your impact on the world.
ReplyDeleteThis class forced us to think about death in many different situations and circumstances and to brush aside the auto-pilot response of the fear of death.
ReplyDeleteDoes death provide meaning in life? Death makes time relevant. You are only granted a certain amount of time to live. Therefore yes I think death gives meaning to life.
Something I agree with in Barry on page 235 he says "Without life's brevity we'd be less inclined to make the best use of time and accomplish something worthwhile and significant." Time limits are motivating. But if you don't think about death and your own time limit you could be unmotivated to do worthwhile things in life. The worthwhile things are arbitrary, but death is inevitable for everyone. Being more conscious of your time limit is motivational. Waking up every morning and asking yourself 'Would I be okay if I were to die today?' helps make death conscious and hopefully motivates people to do the next right thing.
Does death give life meaning? Yes. Death is the next big step in life because who knows where death takes us? Are we going to reincarnated into another life? Are we going to simply cease to exist and become nothing but a memory and dust of the earth? Are we going to go to Heaven or Hell depending on how we lived our lives? Questions that we cannot answer until it is our time to journey through death. Death is the sequel to life; we shouldn't fear it and give it a negative connotation. I'm not saying that we should look forward to death because that can just put a damper on the life that we have left to live. It is a double edged sword, because death takes us to somewhere completely new to us, but if we obsess over our impending death, we forget to truly live life to the fullest.
ReplyDeleteI look forward to my life, especially since I have found a new appreciation and understanding for what death really is: a new beginning. I don't want to die anytime soon because I have so much that I want to accomplish in life. I agree with Emilee, if we keep death as a conscious part of life, I believe that it will help us all to live better lives. We aren't immortal, we aren't invincible, indestructible. We're actually very fragile, but we're durable at the same time. We all need to have an appreciation for life. Death makes us open our eyes and really appreciate our lives.
I saw a cartoon on theChive.com (KCCO) that I found very appropriate. http://thechive.com/2013/04/17/brilliant-simply-brilliant-33-photos/brilliant-i-say-09/
Before this class I did not think about what would happen to ‘me’ when I died. I have thought about if I want my body or organs donated but I’ve never really thought about my soul and this class made me think about that. I believe that death does give life meaning, life is not promised to us and we should appreciate it and work at what we want every day in hopes that we will have a tomorrow. I think that in life we do not always know how people have left their mark on us until they have passed and I cannot think of many things more meaningful than impacting someone’s life. The goal is to live a life that will grant us eternal life in heaven and we should live in the likeness of God so we are granted that. I think that alone gives meaning to life.
ReplyDeleteDeath helps give life meaning. Since each person has a finite time in which to live, each person must choose how to live within that time frame. The choices vary, of course; some choose to pursue pleasure while pleasure is available, while others may seek meaning in what they deem to be higher pursuits - seeking knowledge, spirituality, procreation to extend bloodlines and create legacies, etc. I also think the inevitability of death is what leads people to seek meaning, in either their lives or the lives of others who have passed. If no one ever died, much of the philosophical debate over why we are here would be muted; if something just is, with no apparent beginning or end, the need to make sense of it feels less urgent.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I don't think death is necessary to give life meaning. If a person acts in a particular way, it has a meaning to those affected. Whether it is teaching a child to read or kicking a child's puppy, a child will attach significance to the event, without necessarily doing so because of the finite nature of that child's existence. The actor would also attribute some meaning to it. If we were to hypothesize a perpetual life, I do not think the individual acts in it would lose their meaning.
The biggest thing this course gave me was my own person thoughts on death. Death is not something I ever put much thought into, but after this course I actually developed my own definition and understand other definitions of death. I also learned to appreciate others and their own opinions on death. I think that I will be able to understand death better now and I also think I should write my own living will for my family. Also, since this class its made me so much more aware of death in everyday life and the news.
ReplyDeleteSeeing people die around me was one thing and seems to be happening a lot lately. But this course really made me think about my own life and my own death tha will eventually come one day. This class has taught me so much and I know i will use it to process my thoughts on death for myself, the way i live life, and the so many people around me that will eventually die or have died. It truly gives me a better understanding about so many things and I know this class will help me as I go into the Nursing Profession. I think this is a great course for everyone, because it really does make you think, better understand, and give you new ways to look at things you knew and even didnt know.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes I do believe that death really does give life meaning and that each person has their own unique meaning based on beliefs, the way they live, and their views and understandings on everything.
My response is a little different than those above me. I actually think about death often. A weird "quirk" about my parents are the fact that they tend to say pretty morbid things on a regular basis... If someone passes away, my mom is always quick to point out "that could have been you". While I always roll my eyes and shrug off those comments, they have affected me in the long run. My family also makes a point to say that we love each other before we leave anywhere--since you never truly know what could happen. We always try to be conscious of our own mortality.
ReplyDeleteI've always been conscious of this, too, since the passing of my best friend's mom. For a while I would have nightmares about my own mom being dead, and they would scare me so much that sometimes I would go check on her when she would be napping or sleeping, just to make sure she was okay. To this day, if she's napping on the couch or something, I'll catch myself watching for a second to make sure she's breathing. Maybe that sounds crazy, but after what happened to my best friend (finding her mother dead in bed), it definitely scars you to some degree.
I definitely believe that being actively conscious about your mortality results in living you life differently. I consider myself less careless and more focused than some of my peers. I try to do stimulating things that make me happy. I love learning about new cultures, and I always try to stay active with the world around me. Sometimes this activity can be almost obsessive; so a fine line definitely exists.
After taking this course, I feel that I look at life and death in a different way. I had never really looked at the fear of death as being a motivational tool to drive us to accomplish more things (Barry ch.4). I think this is an interesting idea that is very true. I think it is important for people to come to this realization sooner than later because then they could have many regrets if they don’t realize it until its too late to do anything about it (as seen in the film with Jean-Do regretting being a bad father). I also liked Confucianism ideas about how we should not let thinking about death consume our life because there is nothing we can do about it, so we need to focus on what’s taking place now. I feel that these two thoughts can be molded together in that we need to realize that our life is not going to last forever so we should do the things that we want to do while we have the time, but at the same time we should not let the fear of death consume our every thought and make us miss the things that are going on now that are actually tangible. I like how this course has made me reflect on my life and see if what I’m doing is what I really want to be doing, and not what someone else wants me to do. I feel that I am doing what I want to do, but I can see how the thoughts and expectations of others have influenced some of my past decisions. Realizing this now will help me to avoid making choices based on what I think other people want me to do in the future. This will hopefully insure that I will be living the life that I want and that I have chosen for myself.
ReplyDeleteThis course has definitely changed the way I view life and death. Death has been happening in my family a lot in the last 5 years, and it's hitting close to home knowing that my mom was diagnosed with cancer once again after 13 years of being a survivor. This class made it less hard to think about the negative, and more on living life more, and has helped me to teach my mom not to dwell on the possibility of death. That is one of her biggest fears, and after reading some of the material for this class, I have been able to teach her not to be totally be afraid, and just live life as much as you can with the hope that all will be okay in the end. This class has definitely made me more conscious of my mortality, and that I should not even dwell on my own death, but rather dwell on the fact that I haven't lived enough yet. There are so many things I want to do in this life, and I hope I'm able to live long enough to have all the experiences I want to pursue before I move onto the next.
ReplyDeleteDeath is a topic I do not usually like to discuss because it has occurred to much around me. After taking this course I did learn a lot about death and how to cope with it. Though I did not get to experience as many discussion as I wish I would have, reading through other blogs from classmates allowed me to somewhat catch up and learn how they cope with death and even learn what they believe in regarding death. I have been able to reflect on my life and events within and I have realized I can put more into life and not have so much fear, because you do in fact only live once. Every person in this world have a meaning in their life, there is a purpose for each of us. I have thought to myself what if an event occurs to myself or a loved one such as Ivan's or Jean-Do, what would I do, how would I communicate, would I be able to have enough strength to pull though? This course has prepared me for situations like the aforementioned (I just hope I do not ever have to experience death in such ways). I really did enjoy taking this course.
ReplyDeleteI think it would almost be impossible to take this course and not think differently about death. I hardly ever thought about death before taking this class, but now that we have talked about death in all kinds of different situations and circumstances, I think about it a little more than before.
ReplyDeleteWithout death, what would life be? Death gives life meaning because without it, there would be nothing to fear in the distance. If you were never afraid that one day you were going to die then you would be doing all kinds of ridiculous things. If you know you will die eventually, it will make you change your ways on a conscious level to be safer and value things more.
After taking this course, I am led to believe that death does give life meaning. However, death is not essential in giving life meaning. Life can having meaning without death, death simply aids in giving a meaning to life. Each person has a finite life, a life which is not eternal, and will come to an end at some point. When reflecting over the meaning of life, the reality of death often causes us to reevaluate what life means to us. Take the recent incidence in Boston. People across the country have been forced to consider the reality of death, and in many instances it causes people to seek meaning in their life. I liked what Emilee said, "Without life's brevity we'd be less inclined to make the best use of time and accomplish something worthwhile and significant". Again, when forced to face the reality of death, realizing that our lives are finite, and we are only going to experience life for a certain number of years, it can cause people to reexamine what life means to them. In other words, death does give meaning to life, but it is certainly not the only thing to give meaning to life.
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