Do 'I' wish for death/oblivion?

Actualism
1

So the recent discussion here - Fearing success/what you desire - #52 by Kub933 has unlocked some new avenues for me. It has left me wandering whether death/oblivion is actually what ‘I’ desire deep down.

This is one of those things that I always had some kind of aversion to, like it just sounds too ridiculous. I personally never really felt suicidal and I always had this strong drive to continue surviving. This idea that actually deep down ‘I’ desire death/oblivion just seemed crazy.

And yet I am getting a sense that this is the direction where the answer lies, irregardless of how insane it seems at first lol. In order to allow self immolation I must desire my own demise like I have never desired anything else in my life, now how nuts is that! :laughing:

But something is drawing me to that, because I can see that the only way out of suffering is the ending of ‘being’ and I desire the end of suffering. Although at the moment those 2 things are still separate - there is the desire for the end of suffering and then there is (perhaps intellectual only) understanding that the end of suffering = the end of ‘being’ and vice versa.

But I am getting an inkling that they are indeed one and the same thing, and to go towards the end of suffering (what I have always wished for) is to be moving towards ‘my’ own demise, and to be doing so with the entirety of my ‘being’ - what an absolutely ridiculous thing to do haha I can see why it is thrilling.

3 Likes
2

For me the inklings I get are that deep down ‘I’ want to go into this oblivion, but I very very strongly instinctually feel that I can’t, or I feel compelled to ‘survive’, etc… which means I can’t (read: don’t) let myself do it… which then directly causes resentment of “having to be” alive.

But it is not all quite at the surface level yet…

3

Yeah its a funny one, the sense I am getting is like it is ok to allow myself this thing. Because actually it is what I always wanted anyways, the reasons I had for denying it were just various forms of conditioning. Both on the societal level and also on the instinctual level.

Whenever I find myself swimming in purity, at times when it seems the purity is virtually all that is being experienced, there is a corresponding sense of ‘me’ thinning out, until ‘I’ begin to almost become a fading dream. Then there is that taste of complete emancipation - it seems this is the taste of oblivion. That place is what I desire more than anything else but somehow I have never allowed myself to go there, of course so far I still haven’t.

4

This is actually super interesting. I feel resentful because I feel that I am not allowed to do the one thing which would end my suffering. As if the decision is in somebody else’s hands.

‘I’ am only ‘having to be alive’ because ‘I’ fear death, and yet death is what ‘I’ want - we desire what we most fear anybody :stuck_out_tongue: ?

5

Haha omg. And I only fear death because it feels like it’s physically dying. But this ‘death’ we are speaking of is not that - it is factually speaking a what’s experienced in a PCE! It’s just that ‘I’ am mistaken about what it is! It’s not anything untoward. And it’s not a trick at all!!

I really do want this after all :smile:

6

I was looking at something similar when I was driving just now. When the fear of death came up I looked at what is it that I am actually afraid of?

There was this image of being in this dark abyss, separated from everyone and everything for eternity with no way out - this is what death apparently entails, that is the suffering I am trying to escape, through the misguided attempt at escaping death!

What I am seeing now though is like a reversal of facts, because that place that ‘I’ am so afraid to go to after physical death is actually what ‘I’ am deep down as a ‘being’ already. It is the prospect of existing forever as an identity that is the original cause of suffering and not death! Finally this bit makes sense.

Becasue if ‘I’ self immolate this body is immediately here and ‘I’ would have never actually existed, so there is only the experience of actuality - dark abyss nowhere to be found, it never existed either. Then this body inevitably dies and there is the complete end of ANY kind of experience - again that dark abyss which apparently death lands me in is nowhere to be found… So the whole drama around death is surrounding something that never actually happens.

However, guess where that abyss is at now, it is ‘me’ as ‘being’, of course all part of an illusiory world but the point is the very thing ‘I’ am trying to escape by cheating death is not found at death lol, it is found at ‘being’.

2 Likes
7

Richard had forewarned about this abyss-like experiencing…I’ve had this experience on ocassions too…the trick I remember now is that a total self-immolation should land me into this rich, vital and perfect magical wonderland👻 instead of any abyss like place :

Richard : (Incidentally, that ‘abyss’ description comes from an experience of that nature being a momentary loss of ‘self’ – or even partial loss more likely – as any such abyss-experience stems primarily from a (temporarily) non-egoic glimpsing of death-of-ego, rather than ‘self’-immolation/ ‘self’-extinction in ‘my’ entirety, as it is a feature of pre-awakenment/ pre-enlightenment experiences as well).

2 Likes
8

Precisely the stubborn image I have always held to some degree. Could be a common human intuition. The Christian ideas of heaven and hell which I inherited when very young were useful to me as an effective analgesic for the discomfort arising from that frightening and intuitive image of death you describe. An effective coping mechanism, in other words. Those beliefs served their purpose until incredulity dampered their potency, and other means for coping were explored or relied upon.

Indeed, even the idea of oblivion – of zero experience whatsoever – which, fortunately, is based on much stronger foundations of evidence and therfore less susceptible to incredulity, serves these days as a potent relief to the persistent intuition of that instinctively-derived eternal hell.

I’m convinced it’s a uniquely human conceptual expression of that instinctual aversion to death, which is evidently common to all mammals, if not all vertebrates. The fact of death, and our observations of what it is to no longer be animated, along with the painful aversion that is experienced, seems to get abstracted or conceptualized in our minds, crystalizing into representations and images such as the one you described.

The hedonic pain I have personally experienced of being trapped alone in a dark cramped place (I’m a claustrophobe) gets abstracted and linked to my instinctual aversion to death. It becomes the image that death represents for me. (Are you especially claustrophobic by any chance?)

this [image of being in this dark abyss, separated from everyone and everything for eternity with no way out] is what death apparently entails, that is the suffering I am trying to escape, through the misguided attempt at escaping death! What I am seeing now though is like a reversal of facts, because that place that ‘I’ am so afraid to go to after physical death is actually what ‘I’ am deep down as a ‘being’ already. It is the prospect of existing forever as an identity that is the original cause of suffering and not death!

Brilliant. Somehow we expect to exist … after we cease to exist. It’s nonsensical. When we say that we fear the end of our existence (at least when I say it), it’s actually the fear of the end of an existence that we’re comfortable with, and the commencement of an everlasting existence that we are definitely not comfortable with. True non-existence does not fully enter into our heads. If it did, we’d have absolutely nothing to fear.

Perhaps it would be better to say true non-experience does not enter fully into our heads. (I’ve made a big deal in other posts about how non-existence per se doesn’t exist :smile:. ) So, more accurately, it’s the non-existence of experience that eventuates. The existence of a breathing animated body now terminated, now existing as a non-breathing inanimate body. In time, even the non-breathing inanimate body ceases to exist (decomposition), and its constituent bits and pieces get absorbed into the activities and happenings of nearby objects and arrangements. “Pushing up daisies,” and so forth.

9

More accurately, would it not land you in a place where you no longer exist and no longer experience anything? Absolute oblivion. Total unconsciousness. (Hence the descriptive label self-immolation.)

Hence why the abyss-like experience, despite what our thoughtless intuition informs us, can never persist indefinitely (thank goodness). All things, including all experiences, being finite events, must end at some point in time.

Reflecting on all this, I have to admit the notion of an eternally enduring pleasant experience is personally appealing. But an unpleasant experience that never ends is too horrific to contemplate. Oblivion is a very fair compromise in my estimation.

10

Well put.

11

I’ll bite. As you realized, we don’t fear death per se. We fear being. Specifically, we fear the unending suffering entailed in being. In other words, as you brilliantly unraveled, the “death” that we (rightfully) fear is not true death. Understandably, no one desires that. But there is nothing more desirable than oblivion for someone who is desperately suffering.

12

Bahah that’s really funny. So glimpsing death of ego is the abyss , which is because I would lose myself and my integrity. But then keeping in mind death of soul as the goal presentiates the PCE, and with both soul and ego dying integrity is restored cause you don’t have to go insane haha.

The ego has a good point that feelings are suspect. It makes sense not to have this ego die without the soul at the same time!

2 Likes
13

Shashank is talking about becoming actually free. You’re saying it’s more accurate to describe actual freedom as “total unconsciousness”??

14

Curious - why do you object in particular to “total unconsciousness” and not “absolute oblivion” when they are entirely synonymous?

Screenshot_20230109-192244_Browser
Screenshot_20230109-192244_Browser720×331 72.4 KB

15

My objection is not to those 2 words in particular but to the meaning conveyed by the paragraph they are contained in in its entirety :smile:.

16

Gotcha. Yes, speaking for my “self,” if actual freedom does not entail complete oblivion, i.e., total unconsciousness (bearing in mind that is what oblivion means) then I’m not interested in it.

17

Lately, when contemplating all the efforts I have gone to, especially this past year, it all comes back to something just out of my grasp.

It’s a mental picture of a tiny flame, a small pin, which is holding me together.

It’s not a huge big thing at all, rather something that if removed would crash the whole system.

I keep thinking of that last “slice of pizza” analogy.
That slice is always there. It’s not that we “get rid of” all the other slices, and are left with one; it’s that there only ever was that slice, in a hall of mirrors.

We feel like an insurmountable thing, but it’s that last bit, which is magnified into every other “bit”.

Something about the simplicity of the two facts which Richard repeats again and again;

  1. you have experienced perfection
  2. you can experience it permanently.

The second fact, starts as advise, then through habitually trying it out, one seems to always come back to this hidden variable. This pilot light, recalcitrant screw, last slice.

4 Likes
18

"No matter how many times you shake it and dance the very last drop falls in your pants.”

19

I’m using that one instead of the pizza now :joy:

20

While technically speaking ‘you’ wouldn’t experience anything because ‘you’ wouldn’t be existing , I think the more accurate depiction is indeed a ”rich, vital and perfect magical wonderland”. Otherwise what’s the difference between psychic self-immolation and physical self-immolation beside a C, an A and an L? :smile:. If all you are looking for is to stop existing or experiencing anything then the latter will do just fine (or maybe a less painful way of going about it).