Atheists/Humanists: Do you feel anxiety over death?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are you all going to be about your sins when you die?

Sinful, I guess.

Was that a serious question?

[Anonymous]

I am scared of the pain leading up to death

Every death I have been close to was a slow painful death with hospice and morphine

That scares me

[Anonymous]

I'm an atheist of sorts raised without religion. Have not posted on this thread before. My DH is a buddhist, and he struggles profoundly with the concept of impermanence. He fears death, but he categorizes this mostly as a fear of missing out on wonderful things he's experienced in life that he hopes will continue. He fears dying young and not being present for parts of our young child's life. He fears causing grief to people he loves. He fears non-existence while also understanding per his spiritual teaching that all beings are in an endless cycle of death and rebirth.

DH is generally a very change-averse person who prefers routine and dislikes disruptions to his routine. Even happy disruptions are stressful for him, and he does a lot of anticipatory stressing about things like travel, the beginning of the school year, etc. I think that his fear of death is similar - he is definitely squeamish and is squicked out by the physical realities of death (and ageing, and birth, for that matter) - but really the problem is that it is a change that he perceives to be irreversible.

My advice to him is that he should focus on living in the moment (which is solidly within his spiritual teachings anyway) because regardless of whether there's a hereafter or reincarnation is real or there's just nothing and you don't even know it, what you do know and do control is how you live the life in front of you.

I have never been afraid of death myself, do not feel a God-shaped void, and feel that if people have a God-shaped void and that filling it with God makes them feel less afraid, that is great. No one should die alone and afraid. If someone feels that their God is with them and finds comfort in that, I am all for it. It's just not something I personally have ever ascribed to personally since I was not raised in any religious tradition.

[Anonymous]

I have accepted it. I'm resigned to whatever happens, happens. Everyone else who died before me in human history, also experienced death. The world will keep on turning.

[Anonymous]

Got enough anxieties about life - no time to stress about death.

[Anonymous]

i am an athiest/agnostic and also a palliative volunteer, so have sat with people who are dying - some of them religious, some not. I feel accepting about death. No one has a clue what happens after, including the religious ones so we're all in the same boat. I enjoy my life now and don't worry about it too much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm an atheist of sorts raised without religion. Have not posted on this thread before. My DH is a buddhist, and he struggles profoundly with the concept of impermanence. He fears death, but he categorizes this mostly as a fear of missing out on wonderful things he's experienced in life that he hopes will continue. He fears dying young and not being present for parts of our young child's life. He fears causing grief to people he loves. He fears non-existence while also understanding per his spiritual teaching that all beings are in an endless cycle of death and rebirth.

DH is generally a very change-averse person who prefers routine and dislikes disruptions to his routine. Even happy disruptions are stressful for him, and he does a lot of anticipatory stressing about things like travel, the beginning of the school year, etc. I think that his fear of death is similar - he is definitely squeamish and is squicked out by the physical realities of death (and ageing, and birth, for that matter) - but really the problem is that it is a change that he perceives to be irreversible.

My advice to him is that he should focus on living in the moment (which is solidly within his spiritual teachings anyway) because regardless of whether there's a hereafter or reincarnation is real or there's just nothing and you don't even know it, what you do know and do control is how you live the life in front of you.

I have never been afraid of death myself, do not feel a God-shaped void, and feel that if people have a God-shaped void and that filling it with God makes them feel less afraid, that is great. No one should die alone and afraid. If someone feels that their God is with them and finds comfort in that, I am all for it. It's just not something I personally have ever ascribed to personally since I was not raised in any religious tradition.

Thanks for this lovely, very descriptive post. Regarding your last line, I want to raise the possibily that even if you had been raised religious, you still many not have believed in God, had a "god-shaped void" or been fearful of death. For some people who are raised religious, it just doesn't "take" or it peters out with age and experience or it comes to a more abrupt, sometimes painful, end when the person concludes through study and/or contemplation, that religions are false.

I suspect (but don't know) that people are born with different senses of "god", just as they are born with different personalities, different tastes and preferences and different talents and abilities.

Right now, in our culture, religion is thought to be something good, that we should have and should cherish. As you know, it doesn't quite work that way, and not being religious can be good way to live.

[Anonymous]

No. I imagine it will be like before I was born, which is fine.