For creatures at the top of the food chain with no natural predators, humans certainly have a lot to worry about. Oh no! That person blew smoke in my direction! What if little Jimmy doesn’t get in the preschool of our choice? Oh, I hope the internet doesn’t spoil the season finale of my favorite show since I had to work tonight! What was I saying to my boss after my third glass of wine at the work party?!
These kinds of fears may seem almost comically trite, but in no small way, they erode our daily joy. We have greater fears as well. How will I provide for my family if I’m laid off? How am I going to find love as a 40-year-old divorceé? How am I going to make payroll this week? What’s this lump on my neck?
All of these fears are real and they can all cause us real pain should we realize their worst outcomes. Having said that, none of them compare with the fear of knowing that at some point in the future, everything that we are will be taken from us, at a time unknown to us, and without our consent. In this sense, once we’ve accepted death, that ultimate, inevitable object of our greatest fear, all others pale in comparison.
It’s not just that death outstrips these other day-to-day fears either. As a Thanatist, from the fundamental shift in our relationship with death that comes from our initial conversion, as well as from the daily practices that require us to meditate on our eventual end, we develop the habit of looking at what we fear rather than looking away from it. This habit of looking AT rather than AWAY turns anxiety into resolution.
Further, it’s been shown through multiple studies of game theory, that we humans fear the loss of what we have much more than we fear not gaining something we want. This fixation on protecting what we have is tied to the egoistic clinging to our own personal immortality projects. As we’ve learned already, Thanatism teaches us that these projects are already doomed to failure. We will never hold on to what we have or what we are. It will all come to an end some day. Our fear of loss dissolves, as our realization that loss is inevitable grows.
Finally, as Thanatists, we realize that we have but one life to live. We realize that this life won’t be redeemed at a later date, but is in fact, all that we have. Accepting this reality of life, gives us a certain steely resolution to act. We become less likely to make the decision not to decide. Rather, through our habit of looking clearly at that which we fear, we can commit to action more steadfastly.
I’m not saying that as a Thanatist you won’t have worries. You will. I’m not saying you won’t experience fear. You may feel it daily as you meditate on your personal end. What I am saying, however, is that you will develop a certain fearlessness about life. In the exact opposite way that teens YOLO away life because they don’t understand its value, as a Thanatist, you become so keenly aware of life’s value and yet at the same time of its ephemerality, that you can look into the void of that which you fear most, and with the full resoluteness of your being, act as a fully aware and fully committed human being should.