(1) One of my best friend’s dad died recently, and yesterday was his Celebration of Life ceremony. It was a beautiful day and a wonderful celebration. It wasn’t a bunch of sad people gathered around mourning and wallowing, it was the exact opposite. People were smiling and laughing and crying tears of love and joy. It got me thinking a lot about how our society deals with death.
Death is something that every single one of us is going to experience at some point, yet it feels taboo to talk about. People are very scared of death, and I can understand why, but at the same time, if we spend all of our time trying to avoid the subject, it just perpetuates it as something that’s “bad” and should be avoided.
Death isn’t bad, it’s beautiful. It’s an evolution of our spirit from this body to the beyond. If you spend your life solely trying to avoid death, I don’t think you ever get to fully live. Avoiding death means you’re living in the future, thinking ahead to avoid deadly scenarios that you have no control over. I’m not saying we live hedonistic lifestyles and stop caring about dying altogether, but I am saying that there will always be an air of uncertainty around our deaths, and we need to be okay with that. I want to live as long as I can while still taking advantage of the many opportunities that exist that carry some risk with them. It’s about balance. We are all going to die one day, and the sooner we get comfortable with that idea, the more we can live in the present and enjoy what life has to offer.
(2) I attended the PsyCon Conference in Denver this past week and had an amazing time. It was very different compared to Psychedelic Science earlier this year, and I think I may have actually preferred this one. Without giving too much away, I felt I was able to make more genuine connections with people because PsyCon was smaller and more intimate. People were more open and accessible because there wasn’t as much craziness and distraction. I’ll be doing a full write-up about it shortly on Shroomtown, so stay tuned!
(3) Here’s a little quote for you that I came across:
“The open-minded see the truth in different things: the narrow-minded see only the differences.” – Unknown