First time making a “personal” post and I just wanted to share some thoughts.
I find it appalling how society pressures people, especially women, to remain youthful - appear younger, have clear skin, stay the same weight since their early years. I see the effects of this on my older sister who loathes wrinkles and grey hair. She grew up with reality shows in the 2000s that highlighted appearances and superficiality, all about how to look on the outside…
I feel grateful to spend so much time with my parents (in their 50s). My mother has started growing grey hair and I find it beautiful. She, just like my father, has wrinkles and “imperfect” skin that I can’t help but admire. Wrinkles tell such a story; of the times you smiled, laughed… they tell people you have lived a life of joy.
I can’t wait until I grow older. Grow grey hair (it’s like being blonde but without the yellow… and as a brunette, it seems like such a fun shift), grow wrinkles from laughing and spending time doing things I like. I look forward to travelling in my young years and looking back on it in my older years. I can’t wait to drink coffee with fellow 60-year olds and speak of how fast the world seems to change, yet time for us moves so slowly whenever we spend time together.
I don’t know. Maybe it sounds ridiculous. But I can’t wait to grow as a person. Become 20, 30, 60… I hope one day society will embrace aging and see how pretty life can get at the later stages.
I have heard the same from a number of people, and no offense, but I don’t believe you. When faced with personal annihilation, most people (including myself) quickly discover that they desperately want to avoid death.
In my 30s I was pretty sure I had come to terms with my eventual death. Then I contracted a serious virus that caused my body temperature to begin dropping rapidly. That combined with an intense nausea led to a direct and unmistakable confrontation with mortality. I was not ready and I was terrified. I experienced the visceral knowledge that I was on the precipice of losing everything I knew or cared about. I was, and remain, humbled by death. Because of that experience I tend to be skeptical when others say they are prepared for death.
I had a similar transition in my views between my 20’s and 30’s, but due to violence, rather than disease.
If you don’t mind me asking, what is your age? It may play a factor in your thinking.
Not having a fear of death is not the same thing as trying to avoid death when faced with “personal annihilation”. For example, I try to take care of myself, exercise, eat well, and not put myself in situations that would kill me (e.g., drive 150 mph with no seat belt while drunk) because I don’t want to die earlier than I need to. I am not trying to die faster.
The existential crisis that is triggered when we contemplate our own deaths just began to fade away as I got older. The same thing that happens to all of us – that inability to comprehend\accept the void of nonexistence. Existential anxiety.
If you are under 25, it is very common to have Existential anxiety. Some people need therapy to stop having that anxiety, and that is fine. We’re all on this rock together, and we all progress and deal with things at different rates than others. Life is too short for us to worry about what we know will happen though, so it is better to focus on the now rather than the reaper later on.
I’m 35, and a combat veteran. I don’t fear death in the way you’re describing, but I have been told a number of times that the mature thing to do is cultivate a sense of calm acceptance toward death. I disagree- the reasonable thing to do is try to stop it.