For me, the prospect of ceasing to exist has a calming effect. Not pleasant, as such. I certainly don’t want to die. But the thought that someday, I will not exist at all puts all the day-to-day stresses and worries and regrets into perspective.
There’s an old ‘symmetry argument’ to the effect that life is a thin sliver of light bounded on the one side by an eternity of non-existence before you were born, and on the other by an eternity of non-existence after you die. The suggestion is that one is no worse than the other.
For me, the prospect of ceasing to exist has a calming effect. Not pleasant, as such. I certainly don’t want to die. But the thought that someday, I will not exist at all puts all the day-to-day stresses and worries and regrets into perspective.
There’s an old ‘symmetry argument’ to the effect that life is a thin sliver of light bounded on the one side by an eternity of non-existence before you were born, and on the other by an eternity of non-existence after you die. The suggestion is that one is no worse than the other.