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comment by goobster
goobster  ·  2839 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Lost Another Friend Yesterday

    I couldn't help but notice ... that you shifted from first person to second.

What an interesting observation! You are right...

My intent was to write about the numbness I feel at friends dying, now. It has happened so much in the last 10+ years or so, it doesn't have as shattering of an effect on me as it once did.

I wonder if my atheist/humanist belief system has something to do with it. I see death as purely mechanical... there is no afterlife, nothing that is identifiable as "us" survives death, in my worldview.

So once their switch turns off... it is up to me how to process it. There is no worrying about them, or their afterlife, or anything like that, because I don't believe it exists.

I wonder if that makes me process the experience of death differently...





user-inactivated  ·  2836 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    I wonder if that makes me process the experience of death differently...

In truth, I'd be interested in that as well. I don't know enough, though it's something I'd like to speculate, re: the finality of death in relation to the grieving process of atheism having a different impact...

Although, I'd like to plug as an agnostic, it's a small bit of comfort making myself believe my whole ancestral line is looking upon me. I'd like be going on a complete tangent here, but I think it'd best be reserved for one of those hot n' spicy rd/FanFic discussions.

goobster  ·  2836 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I find being an atheist makes the world 1000% times more interesting and fascinating, and it makes me want to experience all of it, even more.

I am only going to exist once. This is it. Everything around me is the most amazing experience, because there isn't "something better waiting for me after I die."

All of this exists because of unfathomable complexity developing over unfathomable timeframes, and all because of a few rather simple rules about this universe we live in. That makes every single thing - the smallest bug, pencil nub, or grain of sand - inconceivable full of amazingness, if you take a moment and really appreciate it.

That's what atheism does for me.

And since death is final and absolute, to me, it makes me incredibly present and connected to the world around me. I'm not gonna be here again. So let's enjoy all of it!