Into The Dark

I woke up this morning with an overwhelming feeling of dread and anxiety, in a cold sweat, with a horrible lump in my throat and a pit in my stomach. I realized how much I am afraid to die.

Death has always been something of a mystifying subject matter for me. I have pondered and obsessed over the topic for literally years: what happens when you die? Do you still have a tangible form, a body, attached to you? Is it just like being asleep, caught in a bizarre limbo of being cognizant without really being awake? I always have wanted to live forever, but then almost immediately reconsider, because I would not really want to go on living eternally. It seems like there should be some type of a finality to life, like there is to everything else in the world. But at the same time, I cannot fathom my life force being extinguished.

Maybe one of the reasons the paranoia of death has revisited me lately is because I care about someone seriously for the first time, which has really put things into perspective for me: I would not want to imagine life away from the important people in my life. A lengthy period without my parents for support, my brother for laughs, my friends for fun – how can it in any way be peaceful?

I have been reading a lot of blog posts and articles about being a 20-something recently and all the good and bad that comes with this crazy decade in everyone’s life – the pain, the humor, the torment, the uncertainty, the love, the loss, the best years of your life. Life is a journey. And this morning when I awoke with this undeniable pit in my stomach, I realized that my journey is only just beginning. I have such huge dreams, so many things I want to accomplish, so many places I want to see, so many people I want to learn from, that the thought of my life ending anytime soon is absolutely devastating to me. And it is scary.

I am not afraid to admit it – I’m afraid to die. Petrified, even, because of the ambiguity of it. I hope this feeling I have is not some sort of premonition, because like I said, I still have way too much to see and do. What about you guys? Are you afraid of dying? How do you feel about death? What do you think happens?

But if for some reason a life is cut short (and I really hope I’m not jinxing anything), I do not want to have regrets. I want the people I have come across to know just how much they meant to me and how they affected my life, be it negatively or positively. Because at the end of the day, that is something I would want to hear. I would want to know if I was the reason someone made a good choice or felt good about something. And conversely, I would want to know if I did something hurtful to someone so I can learn from it and try to prevent it from happening again.

I want to conclude this brief post with a quote from a book I’m reading now, “13 Reasons Why” by Jay Asher, (shout out to my main lady, Kayleigh Root, for recommending it).

I guess that’s the point of it all. No one knows for certain how much impact they have on the lives of other people. Oftentimes, we have no clue. Yet we push it just the same.”