The mind is constantly rating us on our behavior, constantly comparing things as they are to imagined models of things "as they should be." The mind finds everything wanting: us, others, and the world. It is never satisfied for long. Identification with the mind is the very definition of suffering.

To the extent that we identify with "my mind," our lives will be in constant turmoil. We will be jerked up or down by any tray thought that drifts across our mind.

The dying teach us that to be able to accept ourselves in our true complexity, we must, without judgement, accept the craziness of the mind itself -- accept it without mistaking it for who we really are.

Just Sleeping, Just Eating
For those of us who live in the mind, life is 99 percent an after-thought. It isn't tasting, touching, smelling, loving, being alive; it's mostly the mind thinking about what we are doing. An action occurs, and a moment later we think of ourselves as acting. We see a bird, and a moment later we are no longer seeing the bird, but thinking of ourselves looking at a bird. At other times we live in fantasies of the future or the past. If we start to experience our flow of consciousness as just the mind "doing its thing," we find ourselves relating more directly to the world. It's as though the mind, the "I" disappears, and there is just smelling, just dancing, just seeing the sunset, just sleeping, just eating our food, just being with someone we love.

Letting Go
The dying teach us that happiness comes from learning to let go of the things that cause suffering. Though they've lost much that they desired, they've found much that is of even greater importance. Through their investigation of suffering, they have gotten in touch with something deeper.

The dying teach that it is possible to let go of wanting, that desire is only a cloud that obscures our real nature. We see that our true sources of satisfaction lie in what we already have, and have always had: simple awareness.

Before we began working with the dying, we used to think of those who had not suffered losses as the truly fortunate. No more. We feel sorry for them now.

These well-intentioned people who have, by luck or planning, isolated themselves so well from life may feel perfectly secure in their possessions and their loved ones. They may feel that the whole business of dying has nothing to do with them. They may feel that they have what they want in the world, that they are safe from the flow of change. But we can assure you that for them, the inevitable loss of possessions, the inevitable loss of loved ones, will be the most difficult.

The dying teach us that the real tragedy is not the loss of possessions, not even the loss of loved ones. The real tragedy is losing our connection with humanness, with compassion, with kindness, with forgiveness -- for ourselves and those about us -- closing off to life. In their efforts to find a safe place, to avoid the inevitable suffering of life, these seemingly safe, secure people have merely saved up their suffering. They have put off their pain. They have carried it around without realizing it. And, in the meantime, they have piddled their lives away maintaining their defenses. We have come to feel deeply sorry for such people, because they will experience death with the greatest horror.