Memento Mori💀

Every third thought should be about my grave.

“You could leave life right now — let that determine what you do and say and think.” -Marcus Aurelius

I’m typing this with a heavy heart this morning — a friend of the family died yesterday.

She was about my Sweetheart’s age, and was suffering from unrelenting pain. As I understand the circumstances, she’d had neck surgery recently and had been experiencing this unbearable pain since the surgery. I’m not familiar with any more of the details of her ailment, only that she chose to end her suffering…

“Teach us to number our days, so that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” -Moses

Wow, and the hits just keep on coming. As I’m typing this, my Sweetheart just read a text aloud from her mother that says another family friend has just died as well — a tree fell on him.

I just want to scream out loud, OKAY, OKAY, I GET IT, ENOUGH ALREADY! Our time here is limited — yes, we never know when our number will be drawn.

“Every third thought should be about my grave.” -Shakespeare

This reminds me of an essay I wrote on my birthday, back in March. That essay is titled Tempus Fugit, and it’ll make a great companion to this one. But where it focused more on getting the most out of our time here by being present, this time I’m going a little darker so to speak.

Memento Mori is Latin for “Remember to(that you must) die.” It means that we should remember death, or ruminate on death. I first learned of this from studying the Stoics — all three of the well known stoic philosophers, Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius spoke or wrote extensively on remembering that death awaits us all. Heck, Epictetus even told his students that when kissing their child, brother, or friend — they should remind themselves that they are mortal, curbing their pleasure.

This is not something that we typically talk about in Western Culture — it’s a taboo subject frankly. But it shouldn’t be, death is part of the natural cycle of life. And by keeping that in mind, we can absolve at least some of the fear of the unknown that surrounds it. Because regardless of what we believe comes after, death is an inevitable conclusion to this life for each of us.

“If we kept in mind that we will soon inevitably die, our lives would be completely different.” -Leo Tolstoy

I follow and read a Substacker that goes by the name of Becks on this platform. Becks has terminal cancer, and she’s sharing her daily struggle with death with us. She is a living example of Memento Mori for me — Becks’ outlook on the time she has here inspires me to be more present, and make the most of each precious moment. I highly recommend the essay below👇it’s a perfect example.

A perfect day.

And Friday night I was given yet another unsolicited reminder — that $80k Duramax that I spoke of in my last auto fiction, Harvest Season, well it was totaled yesterday. The other vehicle too! Thankfully my friend survived the crash with minor injuries, as did the other driver. But how easily could that have gone very, very differently?

And then on Saturday morning I ran across this poem — it’s a beautiful tribute from Phillip Slater, to his brother Alistair.

There’s no doubt about it — death is everywhere, so there’s no sense in pretending otherwise.

Friday I downloaded a Memento Mori Life Calendar, and have been filling in the dots. One dot represents one week of life, on an 80 year calendar. I’ve been meditating on death and life while filling in the dots, and so far it’s taken me more than half an hour to fill in less than 20 years worth of dots. It’s really helped me to slow down, and put all this into perspective.

Click the photo to view your own calendar

There is a beginning and ending to all things — an impermanence if you will, and we should always keep this in mind. Yes we will live on in some way, but this life as we know it will end. And by keeping death in front of us, by utilizing Memento Mori, we will be better able to live the life we have — the in-between.

Not sure how to begin a Memento Mori practice? Here’s one from Eckhart Tolle. Below is an excerpt from his article titled, Death and Dying.

In the proximity of death, there is always that grace hiding underneath the seemingly negative event. Death in our civilization is seen as entirely negative, as if it shouldn’t be happening. Because it’s denied, people are so shocked when somebody dies — as if it’s not possible. We don’t live with the familiarity of death.

At any age, the form can dissolve. Even if you are very young, you may encounter death close to you. At any age, it is extremely helpful to become familiar with, or comfortable with, the impermanence of the physical form.

I recommend to everybody, to occasionally visit the cemetery. If it’s a nice cemetery, that makes it more pleasant. Some cemeteries are like beautiful parks, you can walk around and feel extremely peaceful. But even if it’s not nice, spiritually it is just as helpful to walk around the cemetery and contemplate the fact of death.

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