Death Valley

We “walk through the shadow of the valley of death.” That’s the nature of being a conscious human being. Stressful! Even as very young children, we are aware of death, but it seems almost unreal and impossibly far away. But we do the math, and as the years go by, from time to time, we do a ‘death check’. Still a long way off! Whew!

We expect that death will seem closer each time we check, but surprisingly, that isn’t what we experience. It seems as though death were retreating from us. The closer we get, the further it recedes.

This game of soldiers continues until one day we wake up! Suddenly, everything inverts: a phase change. Like planet Earth, our magnetic polls reverse. What was once concave is now convex. Rather than receding, death is now hurtling towards us at break net speed. We freeze, but it makes no difference. Death is coming for us, like it or not; in fact, it seems to be accelerating.

We fell for the oldest trick in book. Life gave us a telescope to see into the misty future, but we have been looking at that future through the wrong end. “It’s over; we’re too late.”

Thank you for reading! Thoughts While Shaving is published each Tuesday and Thursday. To subscribe to our newsletter, complete the form below (bottom right) and never miss a Thought!