Mortality and the Meaning of Life Research Paper

Mortality and the Meaning of Life - Research Paper Example No one can calculate the exact time of when it will strike. Life has become a hectic burden for the common man. It has become a constant headache of keeping up with the payment of bills. That is all there is to life for most people on earth today. Relations have become secondary, values have become obsolete. The only thing that really matters is money. Money is the new god. But we have miserably faced to realize the most valuable commodity of all; time. There is extensive literature on the management of time. But the major part of it concerns with making the most monetary benefit out of it. We are living an illusion of life. The real essence of life has been buried deep beneath this disturbing rush on earth that we are a part of. Science says that a normal human being becomes aware of death normally around the age of 7 (Landau, 2011). But it is hard to tell when he becomes truly ‘aware’ of it. You don’t expect to die when going out for work in the morning or when coming to dining table for dinner, to be honest, the thought of dying hardly crosses our minds all day long, unless of course you love to listen to the news. You, me, we have all lost ourselves in the fast flow of time. It takes just a moment to stop and analyze whether we are passing through this life or is life passing us by. No one, sadly, has that moment to stop and procrastinate in today’s fast paced world. ... The topic of this essay forced me into a deeper contemplation of death than I have ever delved upon it previously. In my research over the topic, I read accounts of people who were diagnosed with fatal diseases and how the revelation changed and constructed their views about the meaning of life and its purpose (zoom, 2009). I learned that mortality plays the central role in giving our lives meaning. Almost all the people whose accounts I read had the same common realization, i.e. live completely in your today and for your today. They felt like that because they weren’t certain of whether they would live to see the next day or not. They wanted to live to their fullest in that very moment that they possessed, not being sure of even the next moment. That made me think; am I sure of my next moment? The answer is no. Life and death are the most unpredictable of all things we know. We witness people dying in their bedrooms and we also hear of people surviving fatal fires. So no, I d on’t know if I even have any time left after I finish this essay. Should we turn pessimistic over this fact and start living in fear of the inevitable. Religions of the world will teach you to do so, to fear your day of judgment if you believe in one, or to fear the consequences of your action after death. But the concept of mortality made me realize that the only thing I have to be fearful of is my ‘now’, to be fearful of the consequences of my actions that I am undertaking right now. There is an inherent beauty to the unpredictability of death. Since you are not aware of when it might arrive, you feel like you can always amend your ways or make right any wrong you might have done. At the same time, you are aware that you have to accomplish whatever gives you the most