Death - An inside story by Sadhguru is a must read by all those who shall die. Sadhguru opens up profound aspects of death. The author dwells upon issues such as what is death?, the process of death, the gracefulness of death, life after death and the riddle of reincarnation.
Sadhguru starts with
a question which is fundamental in nature, what is death? To explain this, he
narrates an incident from our History, the Mahabharata. When Yaksha confronts 4
Pandavas, they ignore him and they all drop dead. Only Yudhisthira, the eldest
of them answers the questions posed by Yaksha.
One of the question
being, "What is the biggest Wonder of life?" Without hesitation, Yudhisthira,
answers, "Thousands of living beings meet death at every moment, yet the
foolish man thinks himself deathless and does not prepare for death. This is
the biggest wonder of life."
Sadhguru reminds, 'जननं सुखम, मरणं करुणम' - Life is pleasure, but death is compassion because it relieves us and hence death is not a calamity. The Human mind is essentially against Death and that is the biggest calamity.
Living dead is a fantastic experience but to be death
like when alive is horribly painful.
While explaining
quality of death, the author distinguishes between Suicide and Samadhi. It is
an interesting perspective, suicide is a result of disturbed mind, injures the
body and is an experience of pain, whereas Samadhi is a result of peaceful
mind, body is in a best possible condition and it is an experience of bliss. He
narrates few Samadhi experiences where people chose to leave the body at their
will. It sends shivers down the spine while reading.
Sadhguru observes
that except man, every creature in the world seems to know how to die
gracefully. He say, “If you walk in a forest, even one that is rich with
wildlife, unless it is an animal that has been killed by a predator, you will
not find a carcass just lying around like that. Why the Forest, even in the
cities, where the birds are mostly crows these days, you will not find a dead crow
just like that. They all know when it is a time to die, so they withdraw to
quite place and gracefully die. It is human being that is becoming increasingly
graceless.”
Finally Sadhguru
advises all to live well so that we can die well. Living well is about knowing
our internal system and of course being healthy.
This is truly a book for all those who shall
die.
Death is the only
fundamental truth everything else is myth.
Dr. Sushant Joshi
