Posts Tagged ‘death’

Living – A Stellar Approach to Death

12/04/2023

By Randall Richards
Living is the story of an ordinary man, reduced by years of oppressive office routine to a shadow existence, who at the eleventh hour makes a supreme effort to turn his dull life into something wonderful.

This was one of the best films I’ve ever seen. Maybe that’s because of my close brushes with death, either personally, or with family and friends who have passed on. Bill Nighy puts on a supreme performance as does his leading lady Aimee Lou Wood as do the other leading actors. The casting is top notch. The cinematography is artful and well thought through, with powerful imagery camera work throughout. Someone in our local community complained the movie is too slow, but with such weighty and important subject matter, it gives the viewer time to digest the themes and messages in the script, plus what is not said, as well is what is. Set in London in the 50’s, and based on Kazuo Ishiguro‘s story, and a remake a Kurosawa classic, it uses these two elements to amplify the lack of clear and open communication we experience more today. One almos wants to scream at the screen, telling the characters to “Open up for God’s sake”. Lastly, (spoiler alert) the timing of William’s death seems too soon in the script. Or does it? Surely he couldn’t die so early in the movie. But then, his story continues in a creative memory, so in essence he is still there for the audience. But isn’t life like that, where death comes too early or earlier than expected? I don’t think this was a haphazard construct of the movie. As mentioned in Rotten Tomatoes’ comments:  Living is a movie that will leave you reflecting on the things you appreciate in your own life. It’s definitely not an action flick, but there’s plenty going on for the soul if you are willing to go there.

Does Death Exist? New Theory Says ‘No’

16/01/2012

Many of us fear death. We believe in death because we have been told we will die.
Editor’s Note:

Dannion Brinkley

For some reason, death has not been a stranger in my life. Western society is almost totally ignorant of death, it is something to be brushed under the rug, and feared. Stay tuned for a posting on “Death, The Funny Side” a talk by Dannion Brinkley, author of Saved by the Light. I heard Brinkley speak at a Whole-Life Expo in Seattle in the late ’80’s – he was promoting his book. I liked his half-hour talk so much that I bought a copy of it andeventually converted it mp3 format.  I plan on posting it here, once I have Brinkley’s permission of course. It’s a classic, that has changed my understanding of what death is, and what it means to be fully alive.  His sense of humor perspective, depth and compassion, after having died  more than once and come back to talk about it,  is remarkable, especially after having been a hit man for the U.S. government.  Ykes.
At Mountain Spirit Institute, one of our core values is addressing our “ultimate concerns”. We believe that by helping to reconnect people to the natural environment, each other and a deeper connection to one’s self, we can help participants start looking beyond the veil. Eckhart Tolle writes” The secret to death is to die before you die, and realize there is no death.” Hmm. Maybe he’s onto something.  Dannion Brinkley is, as well.
R. Richards

Does Death Exist? New Theory Says ‘No’
From: KipNews (Open your mind, Prepare)

A case for staying no death - Biocentrism

We associate ourselves with the body, and we know that bodies die. But a new scientific theory suggests that death is not the terminal event we think.
One well-known aspect of quantum physics is that certain observations cannot be predicted absolutely. Instead, there is a range of possible observations each with a different probability.  One mainstream explanation, the “many-worlds” interpretation, states that each of these possible observations corresponds to a different universe (the ‘multiverse’).

A new scientific theory – called biocentrism – refines these ideas.  There are an infinite number of universes, and everything that could possibly happen occurs in some universe. Death does not exist in any real sense in these scenarios.

All possible universes exist simultaneously, regardless of what happens in any of them. Although individual bodies are destined to self-destruct, the alive feeling – the ‘Who am I?’- is just a 20-watt fountain of energy operating in the brain.  But this energy doesn’t go away at death. One of the surest axioms of science is that energy never dies; it can neither be created nor destroyed. But does this energy transcend from one world to the other?
Consider an experiment that was recently published in the journal Science showing that scientists could retroactively change something that had happened in the past.

Particles had to decide how to behave when they hit a beam splitter. Later on, the experimenter could turn a second switch on or off. It turns out that what the observer decided at that point, determined what the particle did in the past. Regardless of the choice you, the observer, make, it is you who will experience the outcomes that will result. The linkages between these various histories and universes transcend our ordinary classical ideas of space and time. Think of the 20-watts of energy as simply holo-projecting either this or that result onto a screen.  Read the rest of this story…