Life ... Death? - The twins
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In a mother's womb, there were two babies, two wonderful little twin girls. One asked the other, "Do you believe in life after delivery?" The other replied, "Why? Of course, there must be something after the delivery. Maybe we're here to prepare ourselves for what we'll be later."
"Nonsense!" said the first. "There is no life after delivery. What kind of life would that be?"
The second replies, "I don't know, but there'll be more light than here. Maybe we'll walk with our legs and eat with our mouths. Maybe we'll have other senses we can't understand now."
The first says: "That's absurd! Walking is impossible, and eating with our mouths is ridiculous! Here the umbilical cord provides our food and everything we need. But the umbilical cord is so short, life after delivery must be logically excluded."
The second insists: "Well, I think there's something and maybe it's different from what surrounds us here. Maybe we won't need this physical rope anymore."
The first replied, "Nonsense! And besides, if there's life, then why hasn't anyone ever come back from it? Delivery is the end of life, and in the aftermath of delivery, there's nothing but darkness, silence and oblivion. This is getting us nowhere!"
"Well I don't know," said the second, "but certainly we'll meet Mom and she'll take care of us."
The first replied, "Mom? Do you really believe in Mom? That's ridiculous! If mom exists then where is she now?"
The second said, "She's all around us. We are surrounded by her. We are of her. We live in her. Without her, this world would not and could not exist."
The first said: "Well, I don't see her here and now, so it's logical that she doesn't exist".
The second replied, "Sometimes, when we're in silence, concentrating and listening, we can perceive her presence and we can hear her loving voice, calling from above."
- Author unknown -
Death is not the end
From our physical perspective, death appears to be the end of the person. Our senses see a body that is no longer animated by the spark of life, and we can no longer interact with the person in the ways we know. What's more, we're usually unable to see through to the other side, to have any certainty that what the deceased person is is still going on, and we remain frozen with our fear, doubts and regrets. For us earthlings, death seems to be a merciless end point.
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constraints to which they were bound. The body and its crude limitations are gone. The old coat has been discarded and the spirit is free.
Death is not the end. It's a beautiful new beginning. A return home. A journey from the fog of what's less real to the clarity of what's more real. It's waking up from the dream we call physical life.
For those of us who still dream, the fact that the person is absent from our dream can cause deep pain. And yet, in a reality built on the foundation of a loving consciousness, beings who, for us, have disappeared, are separated from us only by the space of a thought. For, unlike the body and its crude consequences, which are so temporary, the love between two people is real and cannot die. Love is never lost. Love prevails over the bonds of matter. It prevails over muscles and bones. Love is the force of incalculable energy that fuels Creation itself.
So when someone we love experiences the death of their body, let's remember our love for them. Let's console ourselves with the awareness that we haven't really lost them, because at that very moment they don't exist any less than before, but in reality they exist much, much more.
- Christian Sundberg - "Mon expérience d'incarnation imminente, comprendre l'humain par le spirituel, tome 1" (Mamaéditions - isbn 978-2-84594-484-8)
The children who leave at dawn
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The children who leave at dawn, where do they go?
To what mysterious call could their young destinies not resist? What have they done with our love and its prayers? The illogical night did not let the dawn give birth to the day. A few steps only sometimes separate the cradle from the abyss. The time is short between the smile that we were still rocking yesterday and the walled sky of a grave. The stream will know nothing of all that his dreams promised him; the rough caress of the rocks, the kisses of the grasses and leaves, the run on the torso of the mountains and on the indolent satin of the meadows. Barely born, the ocean has already swallowed him up.
The children who leave at dawn leave us with our distraught kisses and the weight of our useless tenderness. They leave us with this love that crushes us, that drags its crosses and its remorse. Our lost kisses and our regrets that never go astray.
And we are told: "Life goes on as it goes on. We must go with it." But we, with the stubbornness of poor people who hear nothing of the clatter of their shattered fates, ask ourselves, "What does it matter which way leads to the evening if we have to walk without our child? "He who steals our child also steals the taste of the fruits of the garden of the earth, he steals the hope of the stars and the carefree hours. And he makes of the sky a cold marble where our prayers slide. Our prayers, who hears them? Who will ever hear them? If the sky heard a mother's prayers, the marble would break and her child would return. Do the children who leave at dawn cry thinking of us? "... No, listen to me, behind the veil, the children smile. They are no longer afraid, they are no longer in pain. They have left their tears at the gates of heaven, they have left them on our cheeks. There, the children only know laughter. The laughter of star players, tightrope walkers on rainbows. We do not cry when we play on the dunes of lights that undulate to infinity. When we know that infinity does not open on nothingness but on other horizons, another azure, other songs, other loves."
The time of angels is shorter than that of humans, because angels are not at home here. That is why they are dawn travelers.
When you pass the time of tears and revolt, you will enter the clarity that this angel has left you and that you do not see yet. Then you will grow until you reach the hour that will lead you to him.
Your children are happy. They play hopscotch on the cobblestones of heaven, but on their hopscotch there is no more hell. They are happy. They run laughing on the moving blue sand of the firmament. Their step is not indecisive, nor their flight hesitating over the fiery oceans, the torrents and the volcanoes, over the estuary of time where our destinies go.
Your children speak to you. Don't you hear them? They tell you:
"If you love me, do not doubt that I am still alive. I am alive. Don't you feel my hand caressing your face? Don't you feel the breath of my kisses on your hair? There is no useless tenderness, none of your kisses is lost because I gather them... Now, it is I who watch over you. Life is a cradle and it is us, your children from there, who bend over you. When you no longer hear your distress, it is my voice at last that you will perceive."
The children who leave at dawn are not the children of the night.
They are in the soul of the day. For us, the seasons run away and we believe that they take us towards the evening, towards a horizon of poor hopes. We do not go towards the evening but towards the dawn of our children. They are waiting for us because they have never left us. In the dawn of our children, there is our own eternity.
To what mysterious call could their young destinies not resist? What have they done with our love and its prayers? The illogical night did not let the dawn give birth to the day. A few steps only sometimes separate the cradle from the abyss. The time is short between the smile that we were still rocking yesterday and the walled sky of a grave. The stream will know nothing of all that his dreams promised him; the rough caress of the rocks, the kisses of the grasses and leaves, the run on the torso of the mountains and on the indolent satin of the meadows. Barely born, the ocean has already swallowed him up.
The children who leave at dawn leave us with our distraught kisses and the weight of our useless tenderness. They leave us with this love that crushes us, that drags its crosses and its remorse. Our lost kisses and our regrets that never go astray.
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The time of angels is shorter than that of humans, because angels are not at home here. That is why they are dawn travelers.
When you pass the time of tears and revolt, you will enter the clarity that this angel has left you and that you do not see yet. Then you will grow until you reach the hour that will lead you to him.
Your children are happy. They play hopscotch on the cobblestones of heaven, but on their hopscotch there is no more hell. They are happy. They run laughing on the moving blue sand of the firmament. Their step is not indecisive, nor their flight hesitating over the fiery oceans, the torrents and the volcanoes, over the estuary of time where our destinies go.
Your children speak to you. Don't you hear them? They tell you:
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The children who leave at dawn are not the children of the night.
They are in the soul of the day. For us, the seasons run away and we believe that they take us towards the evening, towards a horizon of poor hopes. We do not go towards the evening but towards the dawn of our children. They are waiting for us because they have never left us. In the dawn of our children, there is our own eternity.
- Jean Paul Sermonte - "La voix du vent" (Editions Le mot de passe)
PASS AWAY
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Death is the death of the body.
The pain, often unbearable, is for those who stay.
But for those who travel, to die is to return home. Go home.
Death has long been no stranger to me. I have repeatedly accompanied people to their last breath and often found myself with others who have just died. The transition is more or less harmonious, more or less painful, but when the moment comes when the person, released from his body, begins to radiate, a wonderful gift is offered to us. Having the chance to contemplate the beloved face radiating deep serenity allows us to contact something of the order of mystery. What we perceive then, without always knowing it, and which interacts with us, is the vibration of the soul of the one who has just left us. It is a real appeasement. An immense consolation.
I have been visited so many times in a personal capacity by loved people or, in the context of sessions, by strangers, that I know with certainty that what we live behind the veil has nothing to do with the difficulties encountered in our daily life. It's much better up there! Although each of us has been born and died multiple times, we do not keep our memories of it, and we elaborate on what awaits us scenarios that can be very far from reality. In most cases, leaving your body is a deliverance, and returning to the bright planes, a happiness. Happiness to recover lightness; to leave behind the heaviness of the limitations imposed by the human body. Happiness to join his friends from up there. His soul family. And her past loves. Happiness to find the spiritual world.
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It is our soul that decides when.
When our souls remind us, nothing and no one can prevent us from joining it. Neither medicine nor prayers. No one on earth can do anything about it. It is a force that completely exceeds us. Long illnesses, accidents of all kinds, sudden deaths during cardiac arrest, stroke ... Whatever form is used, when our soul has decided that our time has arrived, even if it seems intolerable to us humans, everything is fine. Despite appearances, we had finished what we had come to do: learn, understand, teach others and live our time, whether very short or very long. We must then continue our way elsewhere, but in another form.
When our souls remind us, nothing and no one can prevent us from joining it. Neither medicine nor prayers. No one on earth can do anything about it. It is a force that completely exceeds us. Long illnesses, accidents of all kinds, sudden deaths during cardiac arrest, stroke ... Whatever form is used, when our soul has decided that our time has arrived, even if it seems intolerable to us humans, everything is fine. Despite appearances, we had finished what we had come to do: learn, understand, teach others and live our time, whether very short or very long. We must then continue our way elsewhere, but in another form.
Knowing this allows you to experience separation better. Better endure absence. The lack. The feeling of abandonment. There is so much mourning, so hard to do.
- Extract from the frenchbook of Agnes STEVENIN - "Splendeurs des âmes blessées" (Mamaeditons - ISBN 978-2-84594-170-0)
- Extract from the frenchbook of Agnes STEVENIN - "Splendeurs des âmes blessées" (Mamaeditons - ISBN 978-2-84594-170-0)
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Death is a gift and a burden
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"The burden is the grief that loved ones will leave us forever, the absence, the lack that we can never replace.
And the gift is what we are going to do with that. Are we going to transcend ourselves? Are we going to outdo ourselves? Are we going to change everything? Isn't this a great opportunity? "
- Anne Tuffigo - "These souls who guide our steps"
(Video extract from INREES TV - May 2019)
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Like a night owl spreeding its wings
Leaves on the ocean hovering its too frail body
You broke the mooring of the time tonight
To finally caress the firmament
Slowly, silently, carrying luggage,
Your most beautiful memories and the most beautiful pages
Of your life, caressed by the winds of love
Who will accompany you wherever you are, always.
And in this soft satin case that lights up
The moon's silver smile cuddles,
You will sleep in peace, like a little child
Who has just found his mom's arms.
At the very top of this roof dressed in light
You will follow the fate of those who remained on earth.
Because death only destroyed an overly tired body
But the heart and the spirit survive forever.
- Unknown author -
The dead are the invisible, but they are not the absent
Your most beautiful memories and the most beautiful pages
Of your life, caressed by the winds of love
Who will accompany you wherever you are, always.
And in this soft satin case that lights up
The moon's silver smile cuddles,
You will sleep in peace, like a little child
Who has just found his mom's arms.
At the very top of this roof dressed in light
You will follow the fate of those who remained on earth.
Because death only destroyed an overly tired body
But the heart and the spirit survive forever.
- Unknown author -
Live and believe
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Live and believe,
It is also accepting that life contains death
And that death contains life.
It’s knowing, deep down,
In fact, nothing ever dies.
There is no death,
There are only metamorphoses.
You haven't left us
But you went to the land of Life,
Where the flowers
Never again fade,
Where time
Don't know anything about us anymore.
Ignoring wrinkles and evenings,
Where it's always morning,
Where it's always serene.
You left our shadows,
Our sufferings and sorrows.
You got ahead
In the land of Life.
I will flower my heart
Remembering you,
Where you live in me,
Where I live for you.
And I will live twice.
- Father André Marie -
It is also accepting that life contains death
And that death contains life.
It’s knowing, deep down,
In fact, nothing ever dies.
There is no death,
There are only metamorphoses.
You haven't left us
But you went to the land of Life,
Where the flowers
Never again fade,
Where time
Don't know anything about us anymore.
Ignoring wrinkles and evenings,
Where it's always morning,
Where it's always serene.
You left our shadows,
Our sufferings and sorrows.
You got ahead
In the land of Life.
I will flower my heart
Remembering you,
Where you live in me,
Where I live for you.
And I will live twice.
- Father André Marie -
The dead are the invisible, but they are not the absent
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The wonder of this great celestial departure which is called death is that those who leave do not go away. They are in a world of clarity, but they witness, tender witnesses, our world of darkness. They are upstairs and very close.
Oh ! whoever you are, who have seen a loved one pass out in the grave, do not think you are left by him. He is always there. He is beside you more than ever.
The beauty of death is presence. Inexpressible presence of loved souls, smiling to our eyes in tears. The mourned being is gone, not gone.
We no longer see his sweet face; we feel under his wings. The dead are the invisible, but they are not the absent.
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Let us do justice to death. Let us not be ungrateful to her. It is not, as they say, a collapse and a snare.
It is a mistake to believe that here, in this darkness of the open pit, everything is lost. Here, everything is found.
The tomb is a place of restitution. Here the soul takes hold of the infinite; here it recovers its fullness; here it comes into possession of all its mysterious nature; it is untied from the body, untied from need, untied from burden, untied from fatality.
Death is the greatest of freedoms. It is also the greatest of progress. Death is the rise of everything that has lived to the next level. Dazzling and sacred ascent. Everyone receives their raise. Everything is transfigured in light and by light.
(Extract from the speech delivered by Victor HUGO on the grave of his second son's fiancée)
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Death is a birth and birth is a death
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My body is a thin envelope crossed by successive and endless births and deaths. Time acquires a dizzying quality, I am born and I die many times. Fragments of other lives, other deaths, other ways of being are interposed.
At that moment, again I know everything, I understand everything. I am, we are condensations of the process of life. Death is a birth and birth is a death.
- Flavio M. Cabobianco - "I come from the sun" -
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What the dead leave to the living
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What the dead leave to the living is an inconsolable grief, but also an additional duty to live, to accomplish the part of life from which the dead must have apparently parted but which remains intact.
It is the way for the living to put the dead back in the ways of life. This is the way for them not to succumb to death. "
- François CHENG - "Eternity is not too much"
It is the way for the living to put the dead back in the ways of life. This is the way for them not to succumb to death. "
- François CHENG - "Eternity is not too much"
Death is like a rebirth: a passage to a new world
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(...) After stopping the vital functions of the body, the spirit continues its long journey, without beginning or end and that life, of which we are a part of consciousness cannot die. (...) We were one and time had given way to eternity. (...) Death is like a birth: a passage towards a new world of which one can imagine nothing. That is why it frightens us so much.
In reality, when we lose a loved one, we only cry for ourselves. What we call death is in fact for the mind, only a passenger to a new form of being. We know nothing about this new world where the spirit goes after the body dies. And everything we can imagine probably does not correspond to reality because it completely escapes our experience.
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Death is like a birth. When the child is in the womb, the universe comes down to what he sees, feels, hears, perceives. There is therefore for him no other world imaginable than the warmth of the mother's womb. He knows that he will one day have to leave this place which is getting too narrow. He sometimes hears distant echoes that make him think that there is undoubtedly another space beyond the only one he knows, but he has no idea what he may look like. If it were described to him, he would be quite incapable of understanding it, because he has no other experience than that of his life within the womb. And when the moment of the great passage comes, that of his birth, the child is terrorized; he goes into the unknown. A few moments after leaving his mother's womb, he finds himself huddled against her; maternal love reassures him, soothes him and he soon discover and love this new world. Thereafter, he will never want to leave it again.
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The same is true when we die, when the spirit leaves our body. We are naturally frightened by this other Great Passage into the unknown. But we believe that, as soon as the passage is made, we are carried by the love of the Deep Power of the World: its light soothes us and leads us gradually not to a new life because we are never dead, but to a new state of life. And we believe that the ritual of the Grand Passage helps the spirit of the deceased to complete his journey to this Other Shore, where he will continue his way in a way that we ignore everything.
- Frédéric LENOIR - "Coeur de Cristal"
The last moments of life, unique moments
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The last moments of the life of a loved one can be an opportunity to go as far as possible with this person.
How many of us take this opportunity?
Instead of looking directly at the reality of the proximity of death, we pretend that it is not going to come.
We lie to each other, we lie to ourselves, and, instead of saying the essential, instead of exchanging words of love, gratitude, forgiveness, instead of leaning on each other to cross this incomparable moment which is the death of a loved one, by pooling all the wisdom, humor, love of which the human being is capable to face death, at instead, this unique, essential moment of life is surrounded by silence and solitude.
- Marie de HENNEZEL - "Intimate death"
(Pocket Editions - October 2007 - ISBN 978-2-266-16853-3)
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The time of unconditional love
The end of life is most certainly the time of unconditional love. Letting go of the person you love and appeasing them in the face of our future destiny (while at the same time giving them back their own) is certainly painful and difficult, but undoubtedly constitutes one of the most beautiful gestures of love that can be addressed to him.
For Jean Yves Leloup, at the time of death, to love is to love enough to say "Go to yourself, you do not belong to me, blessed be the life that allowed us to walk together, do not stop to the suffering that overwhelms you, go ... "(Marie de Hennezel, Jean Yves Leloup -" The art of dying ").
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"When you love someone deeply," she says, "you cannot condemn them to live because it suits us."
- Stéphane ALLIX and Carine ANSELME -
"When death arrives, an investigation on the border of life"
(Éditions de la Martinière - April 2013 - ISBN 9782732452142)
"When death arrives, an investigation on the border of life"
(Éditions de la Martinière - April 2013 - ISBN 9782732452142)
Death is part of us
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Death is part of us. Our body is programmed to die. It follows a natural cycle on which harmony on earth depends. Imagine what the planet would be like without death: what chaos!
Death is truly part of life, it is a necessary and healthy component of it. But this is indeed the death of our material vehicle. Our soul continues on its way. Life goes on in another form.
... Death does not exist, the bonds of love endure and remain effective. We are forever linked.
- Stéphane ALLIX - "The test"
(Éditions Albin Michel - Novembre 2015 - ISBN 978-2-226-31908-1)
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Death, what does this term mean ?
The truth is that we don't know anything about our person, since as long as we are alive we cannot experience it, and where as soon as we are dead, we will no longer be able to feel and express what it really is.
Death does not scare us as such since we completely ignore what it is. Panic in the face of this strangeness therefore has nothing to do with the common idea of the end of life and the extinction of the physical body. It actually means something else entirely.
It should not be taken in the first degree. It is in fact linked to the painful sensation of nonexistence in the heart and the attention of others in those who suffer from the absence of themselves.
- Moussa NABATI - (French book) "Like a void in me - Living in the present"
(Éditions Le Livre de Poche - January 2014 - ISBN 978-2-253-17682-4)
(Éditions Le Livre de Poche - January 2014 - ISBN 978-2-253-17682-4)
The blue butterfly - The sky is mine ...
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The Blue Butterfly is a Quebec film made in 2004 by Léa Pool.
Inspired by a true story, this film tells the adventure of Georges Brossard who, at the request of the "Children's Wish" Foundation had taken in 1987, to South America, a young boy in terminal phase to allow him to capture before dying, a very rare butterfly "the blue morpho" that he wanted to add to his collection.
The beautiful song (in french) "Heaven is mine" by Marie-Elaine THIBERT, illustrates this film.
I share the translated text with you :
Almost at the end of my time.
But, behold, these are open
The great arms of light
And here I go to the universe.
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I go up, I go up.
I fly.
Heaven is mine.
I'm talking to the stars.
I soar from sun to sun.
I fly, I fly.
I shine, I shine.
I live.
Heaven is mine.
Infinity is blue.
Blue and soft and good and wonderful.
I was lifeless and speechless.
The soul full of "why",
Lost in silence and in words.
What is the reason for things,
Galaxies and roses?
We know it when we know
How beautiful everything is.
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I'm leaving, I'm leaving.
I go up, I go up.
I fly.
Heaven is mine.
I'm talking to the stars.
I soar from sun to sun.
I fly, I fly.
I shine, I shine.
I live.
Heaven is mine.
Infinity is blue.
Blue and soft and good and wonderful.
I was lifeless and speechless.
Without hope and without joy.
Almost at the end of my time.
But, behold, these are open,
The great arms of light
And here I go to the universe.
Infinity is blue.
Blue and soft and good and wonderful.
I was lifeless and speechless.
Without hope and without joy.
Almost at the end of my time.
But, behold, these are open,
The great arms of light
And here I go to the universe.
Such a soft imprint
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This is what Béatrice GERNOT tells us through the story of Leda and Olivier in "Death is part of life"
(Read & discover - Testimonials):
In awareness of this life and death that connects us.
Death, attached to our life, to the very idea of life, very often makes us dread the last moments, as if the last breath made us fall into void, oblivion, as if death acted as an irreparable breaking. As if nothing more had happened, would happen. As if this life to which we were linked could not continue again and again because the body had ceased to be in motion.
Death, attached to our life, to the very idea of life, very often makes us dread the last moments, as if the last breath made us fall into void, oblivion, as if death acted as an irreparable breaking. As if nothing more had happened, would happen. As if this life to which we were linked could not continue again and again because the body had ceased to be in motion.
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Accompanying life to death, to the point of no return, can, indeed, be experienced as a privileged moment, a moment of acceptance, even of reconciliation between the dying and his loved ones.
These moments, which often reconcile our fragility and our humanity, in no way exclude the pain of loss but allow us to be in the presence of the Other, of his words, of his silences until the end, until the last breath. Intense moments that help everyone find their place and move on.
These moments, which often reconcile our fragility and our humanity, in no way exclude the pain of loss but allow us to be in the presence of the Other, of his words, of his silences until the end, until the last breath. Intense moments that help everyone find their place and move on.
In “Final Moments”, a radio report by Élise ANDRIEU, Leda, tells us about the sweetness of the last hours spent with Olivier, the man of his life, 50 years old, suffering from cancer to whom she takes the time to reiterate her love, of this stronger love which - she tells him - will continue to exist beyond death, of her acceptance to let him go. Yes, let him go. With a few words of disarming simplicity, she reassures him, and opens the gap on what, for many, is of the order of the unacceptable: "I can't hold you back, you can leave." An authorization of an unparalleled humanity which places love far beyond the body limited to its carnal envelope. A sentence that authorizes Olivier who is suffering so much to let go and which allows Leda, soothed, to live these last moments of life in truth with Olivier. "Everything became simple ... No stake, no mask", just two beings who love each other in being, in silence, in a mutual respect of great intensity.
- Beatrice GERNOT - "Death _ France Culture"
"Reassuring presence, Leda soothes Olivier - to whom she promised to be there at the time of his death - when she is away for a few short moments, and" takes him in his arms, his head in his neck and gradually feels his sobbing which subsides, and then, his breath, his last breath. It was very soft, she said like a feather flying away. And he left."
This sweetness Leda felt it for a long time on her skin, and if she physically suffered from this departure in the early days of mourning, “she kept a very soft place in the neck. An invisible and light tattoo like everything”.
This testimony of great strength and fullness, tells us the importance of being, when we can, in the presence of the other to walk together towards the inevitable, in awareness of this life, of these moments of life which still connect us and drag us far beyond death. In an eternity of sharing that soothes and opens up new possibilities for us. "
- Béatrice GERNOT -
(Published on May 28, 2015 in "Read & Discover, Testimonials")
Special thanks to the manager of the French Facebook page "JP29 Without you my child" for making me known and for allowing me to share this article.
- Beatrice GERNOT - "Death _ France Culture"
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"Reassuring presence, Leda soothes Olivier - to whom she promised to be there at the time of his death - when she is away for a few short moments, and" takes him in his arms, his head in his neck and gradually feels his sobbing which subsides, and then, his breath, his last breath. It was very soft, she said like a feather flying away. And he left."
This sweetness Leda felt it for a long time on her skin, and if she physically suffered from this departure in the early days of mourning, “she kept a very soft place in the neck. An invisible and light tattoo like everything”.
This testimony of great strength and fullness, tells us the importance of being, when we can, in the presence of the other to walk together towards the inevitable, in awareness of this life, of these moments of life which still connect us and drag us far beyond death. In an eternity of sharing that soothes and opens up new possibilities for us. "
- Béatrice GERNOT -
(Published on May 28, 2015 in "Read & Discover, Testimonials")
Special thanks to the manager of the French Facebook page "JP29 Without you my child" for making me known and for allowing me to share this article.
I wait for death like a sweet thing
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I am at an age when it is well known that death can no longer be very far away. One year, two years, three years ... Five years would be a little too much compared to what we normally live ... So I know that death will come soon and it is a good thing. I am happy to be mortal, because I think that it is mortality which gives meaning to life. We only live if we can die. Everything that lives - this is what all the wisdoms in the world teach us - is something that “goes to death”.
My life will go until death, and when death comes, I will welcome it with a slightly personal feeling, because I am sure that this experience will be like many other experiences of my life: unique.
We only meet love at times, we apparently only meet death once. So far, “nobody has come back from those bones”, as Shakespeare says, so we don't know what death is. However, we can well say that it is not nothing. It is surely something.
This “something” excites my curiosity. I say “gluttony” to make chic, because it's nice to be greedy of death, but it is obviously only a formulation. What I mean is that not only am I not afraid of it, but that the moment we put the word “end” to my life, it will have given it its full meaning, and is not that bad to be able to look at a life at the end saying to yourself “this is what I have been”.
- Stéphane HESSEL - (1917 - 2013)
Born German, naturalized French, resistant, he had been deported to Buckenwald -
Born German, naturalized French, resistant, he had been deported to Buckenwald -
Letter from elsewhere
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You wished to write to me, leaving the care to the clouds, the care of transmitting your message to me.
This single intention authorizes me to answer you in order to tell you that when I left, I did take away all the richness and love of our experience, and, if from the weight of my body, I got lighter, I didn’t no less, in the shade, by your side.
Therefore, if you are looking for our yesterday, let your thoughts and dreams wander within you, because, in these journeys, we will meet to live together this intimate bond, and thus give all its strength to his eternity.
Whether the caress of the wind, a ray of sunshine, a shooting star or a drop of rain are the angels carrying this writing to translate the feeling to you, so that, leaving aside regrets as you forget, you will live intensely each moment of life.
- Michel THIVENT -
When tomorrow will begin without me
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When tomorrow begins without me, that I will not be there to see if the sun rises, to discover your eyes full of tears for me, I would so much that you do not cry as you cried today thinking of all these things we did not tell ourselves.
I know how much you love me, as much as I love you and whenever you think of me, I also know that I will miss you.
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But as I turned to leave, a tear came out of my eye. Because all my life, I had always thought that I did not want to die. I had so much to live. So much to do again. It seemed almost impossible to leave you.
I thought of all the "yesterday", the good and the bad.
I thought of all the love we shared and all the pleasure we had.
If I could relive yesterday even just for a moment, I'll say goodbye and kiss you. And maybe you'll see me smile.
Then I realized that it could not be because the emptiness and the memories would take what was my place.
I thought of you, and then my heart was filled with pain. but when I went through the gates of heaven, I felt so much at home.
I thought of all the love we shared and all the pleasure we had.
If I could relive yesterday even just for a moment, I'll say goodbye and kiss you. And maybe you'll see me smile.
Then I realized that it could not be because the emptiness and the memories would take what was my place.
I thought of you, and then my heart was filled with pain. but when I went through the gates of heaven, I felt so much at home.
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I promise no tomorrow because today will always last. And since every day is the same way, there is no past to regret.
You have been so faithful, so confident and so true. Although sometimes, you did some things that you knew you did not have to do. But you have been forgiven. And now finally you are free.So do you want to come and take my hand and share my life with me ? "
So when tomorrow begins without me, do not think we are far away because every time you think of me, I am there, in your heart.
- David M. Romano -
Goodbye because this day will not come back
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Goodbye because this day will not come back :
if the race tomorrow, is still there,
it's another day that I'll see her,
that I will face it, more rested already,
older than a day,
that is, closer to wisdom
which comes back to experienced men.
if the race tomorrow, is still there,
it's another day that I'll see her,
that I will face it, more rested already,
older than a day,
that is, closer to wisdom
which comes back to experienced men.
"Life in blue" - Martin STEFFENS -
(Why is life so beautiful in the test)
RESURGAM (Resurrection)
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There is no death! Our stars are sleeping
To get up on a more beautiful shore.
And in the glittering crown of the sky
They shine forever.
To get up on a more beautiful shore.
And in the glittering crown of the sky
They shine forever.
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The dust we walk
Will change under the showers of spring
In golden grain or ripe fruit,
Or in flowers in the colors of the rainbow.
The granite rocks are falling into dust
Or in flowers in the colors of the rainbow.
The granite rocks are falling into dust
And feed the hungry moss they carry.
The most beautiful leaves drink their daily life
In the invisible air.
The most beautiful leaves drink their daily life
In the invisible air.
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There is no death! The leaves can fall,
The flowers will fade and pass
During the winter days they only wait
The arrival of the month of May.
And near us, constantly, though invisible,
Move the radiant immortal spirits,
Because the infinite universe
Is life, death does not exist !
The flowers will fade and pass
During the winter days they only wait
The arrival of the month of May.
And near us, constantly, though invisible,
Move the radiant immortal spirits,
Because the infinite universe
Is life, death does not exist !
(Edward George Earle Bulwer-Lytton, 1803-1873)
"The grave is a cradle,
To die in the world is to be born to eternity "
- Doris LUSSIER -
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I have only a small, natural faith, fragile, vacillating, muddy and always worried. A faith that is more like hope than certainty.
But you see, in the short light of my weak reason, it seems to me irrational, absurd, unfair and contradictory that human life is only an insignificant passage of a few hundred days on this ungrateful and sumptuous land.
It seems to me unthinkable that life, once begun, ends stupidly with a melancholy dissolution in matter, and that the soul, like an ephemeral splendor, sinks into nothingness after having uselessly been the spiritual and sensible place of such prodigious brilliancy. such rich hopes and sweet affections.
It seems to me repugnant to the reason of man as much as to the providence of God that existence is only temporal, and that a human being has not more value and other destiny than a pebble.
I have already lived much more than half of my life. I know that I am on the other side of the peaks and that I have more past than future. So I wisely tamed the idea of my death. I domesticated her and made her my companion so everyday that she does not frighten me anymore ... or almost. On the contrary, it goes so far as to inspire me with thoughts of joy. It seems like death teaches me to live.
So much so that I have come to think that true death is not dying, it is losing one's reason for living.
And soon, when it will be my turn to climb behind the stars, and to pass on the other side of the mystery, I will know then what was my reason for living. Not before.
To die is to know, finally.
Without hope, not only does death no longer make sense, but life does not have any more.
What I find beautiful in human destiny, despite its apparent cruelty, is that for me, to die is not to finish, it is to continue otherwise.
A dying human being is not a mortal who ends, he is an immortal who begins.
The grave is a cradle.
To die in the world is to be born to eternity.
Because death is only the black door that opens on the light.
Death can not kill what does not die. But our soul is immortal.
There is only one thing that can justify death ... It's immortality.
To die, at bottom, it is perhaps as beautiful as to be born.
Is the setting sun not as beautiful as the rising sun ?
A boat that arrives safely, is not it a happy event ?
And if being born is only a painful way to access the happiness of life, why die would not it be that a painful way
to become happy ?
The most beautiful thing I read about death is Victor Hugo who wrote it. It is an admirable song of hope at the same time as a poem of immortality.
"I say that the tomb that on death is closing
Open the firmament,
And what here below we take for the term
Is the beginning."
- Doris LUSSIER - "The re-birth" -
But you see, in the short light of my weak reason, it seems to me irrational, absurd, unfair and contradictory that human life is only an insignificant passage of a few hundred days on this ungrateful and sumptuous land.
It seems to me unthinkable that life, once begun, ends stupidly with a melancholy dissolution in matter, and that the soul, like an ephemeral splendor, sinks into nothingness after having uselessly been the spiritual and sensible place of such prodigious brilliancy. such rich hopes and sweet affections.
It seems to me repugnant to the reason of man as much as to the providence of God that existence is only temporal, and that a human being has not more value and other destiny than a pebble.
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So much so that I have come to think that true death is not dying, it is losing one's reason for living.
And soon, when it will be my turn to climb behind the stars, and to pass on the other side of the mystery, I will know then what was my reason for living. Not before.
To die is to know, finally.
Without hope, not only does death no longer make sense, but life does not have any more.
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A dying human being is not a mortal who ends, he is an immortal who begins.
The grave is a cradle.
To die in the world is to be born to eternity.
Because death is only the black door that opens on the light.
Death can not kill what does not die. But our soul is immortal.
There is only one thing that can justify death ... It's immortality.
To die, at bottom, it is perhaps as beautiful as to be born.
Is the setting sun not as beautiful as the rising sun ?
A boat that arrives safely, is not it a happy event ?
And if being born is only a painful way to access the happiness of life, why die would not it be that a painful way
to become happy ?
The most beautiful thing I read about death is Victor Hugo who wrote it. It is an admirable song of hope at the same time as a poem of immortality.
"I say that the tomb that on death is closing
Open the firmament,
And what here below we take for the term
Is the beginning."
- Doris LUSSIER - "The re-birth" -
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"The dead are invisible
They are not absent"
- Saint Augustin -
I went to the end of the trip
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"I went to the end of the trip and the sun for me went to bed.
I do not want a dark and funeral ritual.
Why cry a liberated soul?
Regret my absence a little, but not too long ...
And do not let suffering overwhelm you.
Remember the love we shared.
Regret my absence, but let me go ...
Because it's a trip that all we have to do
and that everyone must perform alone.
It is part of the path that God has traced to us
and leads us to his blessed household.
When you suffer from loneliness and melancholy,
turn to your loved ones, your friends
and forget your sorrow by doing good ...
Look at the life I'm starting and not the one I'm finishing. "
- From Nicole Charest's book "Little sweets for the heart" -
I do not want a dark and funeral ritual.
Why cry a liberated soul?
Regret my absence a little, but not too long ...
And do not let suffering overwhelm you.
Remember the love we shared.
Regret my absence, but let me go ...
Because it's a trip that all we have to do
and that everyone must perform alone.
It is part of the path that God has traced to us
and leads us to his blessed household.
When you suffer from loneliness and melancholy,
turn to your loved ones, your friends
and forget your sorrow by doing good ...
Look at the life I'm starting and not the one I'm finishing. "
- From Nicole Charest's book "Little sweets for the heart" -
Death is nothing
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"Death is nothing, I only went to the next room.
I am me. You are you. What I was for you, I am forever.
Give me the name you have always given me, speak to me as you have always done.
Do not use a different tone, do not look solemn or sad.
Keep laughing about what made us laugh together.
Pray, smile, think of me, pray for me.
May my name be pronounced at home as it has always been, without any emphasis, without a trace of shadow.
Life means all that it ever was. The string is not cut. Why would I be out of your mind just because I'm out of your sight?
I'm not far, just on the other side of the road and you see, everything is fine. "
- Charles PEGGY -
- according to a text of Saint Augustin -
- according to a text of Saint Augustin -
Someone dies
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Someone dies
And it's like steps
That stop
But if it was a departure
For a new trip ?
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Someone dies
And it's like a door slamming
But if it was a passage
Opening on other landscapes ?
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Someone dies
And it's like a falling tree
But if it was a seed
Sprouting in a new land ?
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Someone dies
And it's like a screaming silence
But if it helped us hear
The fragile music of silence ?
- Benoît Marchon -
Cremation
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At the moment of cremation, fire, symbol of life and death, participates in the ultimate metamorphosis of the human being. He turns it into ashes that will be scattered by relatives in nature.
Man becomes dust and the phoenix returns to the origin of the world. One day soon, the elements that constitute it will participate in developing a new form of life. Everything is transformed, nothing is lost.
- Hindu teaching -
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We belong to the big all
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We are part of the earth and it is part of us.
The fragrant flowers are our sisters.
The deer, the horse, the great eagle are our brothers.
At the moment of death, we blend into each other and,
together we join the Great All. "
Chief SEATTLE
The fragrant flowers are our sisters.
The deer, the horse, the great eagle are our brothers.
At the moment of death, we blend into each other and,
together we join the Great All. "
Chief SEATTLE
The sacred thresholds of our journey
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This body is not me. I am not limited by this body.
I am life without limits.
I was never born and I never died.
Look at the ocean and the sky filled with stars,
the wonderful manifestations of the true spirit.
Since the first hour, I have been free.
Birth and death are just doors through which we pass, the sacred thresholds of our journey.
Birth and death are a game of hide and seek.
So laugh with me, hold my hand, let's say goodbye, goodbye, to meet again soon.
We meet today. We'll meet again tomorrow.
We will meet at the source at every moment.
We meet each other in all forms of life.
I am life without limits.
I was never born and I never died.
Look at the ocean and the sky filled with stars,
the wonderful manifestations of the true spirit.
Since the first hour, I have been free.
Birth and death are just doors through which we pass, the sacred thresholds of our journey.
Birth and death are a game of hide and seek.
So laugh with me, hold my hand, let's say goodbye, goodbye, to meet again soon.
We meet today. We'll meet again tomorrow.
We will meet at the source at every moment.
We meet each other in all forms of life.
- Thich Nhat Hanh -
The dance of existence
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"The birth is a passage that allows us to understand that death is just another particular movement of the dance of existence."
- Catherine BARRY -
"Little Treatise on Death to Chew Life with Happiness"
The impermanence of things
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Impermanence is one of the fundamental laws of existence, but we forget and conceal it. We hope that by refusing and denying this reality, we will be able to retain people and things.
But the moment of death will come. We can not avoid it. Nothing can hide, hide the reality of impermanence. It manifests itself relentlessly. It is better to accept it and prepare for it.
But the moment of death will come. We can not avoid it. Nothing can hide, hide the reality of impermanence. It manifests itself relentlessly. It is better to accept it and prepare for it.
- Zopa RINPOCHE -
Every day, we have to learn how to die
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"... It is impossible to escape this ordeal. We are going to abandon our body, our life and our personal history ... An important process of abandonment is at the heart of the very process of death. It is necessary to understand and discover ... Death, far from being only that moment that can arise any time and sign the end of my existence, is constantly at work, we are constantly dying for something. Not only in the mourning and separations, but every time we give up grasping something.
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In this sense, to evoke death is to learn how to open one's heart, to touch a sense of essential letting go, it is to give back to our existence its importance and seriousness. Every day, we must learn to die to live better, being more joyful, serene and human."
- Fabrice MIDAL -
- Founder of the Occidental School of Meditation -
- Founder of the Occidental School of Meditation -
"The rupture of the contract" - Anne GIVAUDAN -
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"We have lost sight of the fact that life contains in it the very Essence of Existence and that it never ends."
The game of life and death
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Death is part of life ; but our Western society has made it a taboo. The elders knew it well. Today, everything is done to make us forget it. Which is very unfortunate because to apprehend the death, his own death, would avoid much suffering in the day of departure for the great trip, whether it is our departure, that of a relative, or a loved one and would greatly facilitate the work mourning.
My experience accompanying end-of-life people, reinforced me in this idea. I was able to accompany people on the verge of death, or their relatives, who were in the acceptance but also many who were in the questioning.
Whatever the religion, whether one is believer or not, every day, we must learn to die to live better, to die to reborn in the unknown ...
To illustrate my comments, I would like to share with you an excerpt from Catherine BARRY's book, entitled "Little treatise on death to crunch life with happiness" and more precisely, an article by Fabrice MIDAL, founder of the Occidental School of Meditation , entitled :
"the game of life and death"
"... Personally, what matters to me and enlighten me in Buddhist teaching and made me devote myself to it is the way it allows to experience concretely my existence here and now He makes me discover that death, far from being only that moment that can come up anytime and sign the end of my life, is constantly at work, we are constantly dying for something. only in the mourning and separations, but each time we give up grasping something.In this sense, to evoke death is to learn how to open one's heart, to touch a sense of essential letting go, our existence its importance and its gravity Every day, we must learn to die to live better, being more joyous, serene and human. "
- Catherine BARRY - "Little treatise on death to enjoy life with happiness"
(Editions Philantrop '- France Loisirs 2013- ISBN 978-2-298-04906-0)
What is death ?
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Everyone has their own idea, their own feelings, in the face of death. Here is the analysis made by Elisabeth KÜBLER ROSS.
"Death is simply the body that gets rid of its envelope, like the butterfly coming out of its cocoon.
Death is the acquisition of a higher state of consciousness where you continue to perceive what is happening around you and in you, to understand, to laugh, to grow.
The only thing you lose is something you no longer need: your body. It's like taking off your coat in winter when spring comes. "
- Elisabeth KÜBLER-ROSS -
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A sailboat passes ...
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I'm standing by the beach
A sailboat passes in the morning breeze and goes to the ocean.
He is beauty and life. I watch it until it disappears on the horizon.
Someone at my side said, "He's gone" Party to where?
Starting from my eyes, that's all.
His mast is still high.
Its hull always has the strength to carry its human load.
His total disappearance from my sight is in me, not in him.
And when someone near me says, "He's gone"
There are others who, seeing him appear on the horizon and come towards them,
exclaim with joy: "Here it is".
A sailboat passes in the morning breeze and goes to the ocean.
He is beauty and life. I watch it until it disappears on the horizon.
Someone at my side said, "He's gone" Party to where?
Starting from my eyes, that's all.
His mast is still high.
Its hull always has the strength to carry its human load.
His total disappearance from my sight is in me, not in him.
And when someone near me says, "He's gone"
There are others who, seeing him appear on the horizon and come towards them,
exclaim with joy: "Here it is".
That's death.
- William BLAKE -
- William BLAKE -
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