In The End, Life Turns To Be A Dream. I Prefer Pleasant Dreams.

We all know that we will die one day. Some of us live with this awareness. Some of us afraid of death. My life philosophy is using the power of optimism to cope with the paradox of mortality.

Image by Karin Henseler from Pixabay

This story reflects a thought process based on my personal and humble perspectives on mortality.

I want to share how I use my thought process as an advantage to maintain an optimistic and joyful life despite the scary reality looming behind and in front of us.

Like many of us, I think about death and its impact on my well-being.

I am a scientist and a technologist with a strong interest in philosophy, spirituality, and mental health.

Death is inevitable. It may knock the door anytime. We never know when and where. tackle

How I tacklee mortality with optimism

In the end, when we reach to our final breath on this earth, our lives will turn to a dream.

Some of us will experience it as a pleasant dream, some of us with full of regrets, and some of us even as a nightmare. We all may fall in somewhere on the scale of this spectrum.

The reality is we are all mortals.

Inevitably, we will all experience our final moments on this planet one day.

The distractions from the noise of frenetic modern world mask the reality from our conscious. The noise makes us forget reality.

I look at mortality from several angles.

Ironically, some of us act like we will be living forever.

The prime example for this ironic case relates those elderly people who stringently attempt to save money for the rainy days trading off their health and happiness, even though they have substantial wealth.

From a scientific perspective, we know that our genes are programmed to decay and die ultimately. The proof is in our shortening telomeres (specific DNA–protein structures).

Even though this norm sounds depressive, some stoic thinkers believe that thinking of our mortality paradoxically induces joy and passion.

I studied existentialism and touched on this interesting life philosophy in many essays.

The existentialist point of view debilitated humanity since we developed our cognitive part of the brain.

Many philosophers, scientists, and technologists included the concern in their agenda. Solutions are negligible and conflicting however new insights are emerging.

some of us find relief in some creative ways to deal with this existentialist dilemma.

For example, reputable stoic philosophers were adamant on thinking about our mortality regularly and in a conscious way. They believed that thinking on our mortality could help us live in the moment with appreciation and gratitude.

Let’s take my favourite philosopher, Marcus Aurelius, as an example, who said:

“Think not disdainfully of death but look on it with favour. For even death is one of the things that Nature wills.”

Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

When I am talking about optimism, I always consider appreciation and gratitude for life.

Modern psychology confirms that living with appreciation and gratitude can replace or prevents negative thoughts triggering and leading to strong emotions such as anxiety, fear, jealousy, and anger.

My personal approach, with influence from stoic thought leaders, is to focus on the things that we can control and not concern about the things we cannot control.

Death is one of the things that we cannot control.

We cannot control our mortality. However, we can partially control or at least influence the factors leading to joy and happiness in our lives.

The universe is full of unknowns.

There appear to be more unknown unknowns than known unknowns when we look at from cosmological perspective.

We started to understand some mechanisms of life and the universe via science and philosophy, but our knowledge is negligible. It is just like a drop in the ocean.

None of us knows the reasons behind the programming of our DNAs for mortality yet.

Many scientists and philosophers are asking why our DNA was programmed to die. I asked this question many times when I was studying existentialism.

If we look at death from an optimistic perspective, we may end up thinking that our consciousness may transform into a better self.

We haven't defined this better self yet but some believe its existence.

Whilst pessimists see the mortality phenomenon as, decay, as an optimist I choose to see death as transformation. I have no idea who is right or wrong. And I don't care to be right at all times. What matter is how I enjoy life with my limited knowledge and capabilities.

The good news is that at least we now know that optimists live longer than pessimists.

However, these types of studies indicate that only 25% of our optimism is programmed by our genes. The rest is up to us and how we respond to life challenges.

This is a piece of powerful knowledge. It means that we have a 75% effort in front of us to influence the life factors for joy and happiness.

I don't know about you but I want to have a pleasant dream in the end.

Thank you for reading my perspectives.

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