It was an average summer evening. Nothing special happened during the day that could’ve disturbed me, so it was a peaceful one. I finished my plans for the evening, took a last look at the moon, closed curtains, and went to bed. For some reason I could not fall asleep, usually I fall asleep within 15 minutes, but not this time. To fall asleep I tried to think about nothing and everything at the same time, hoping that I’d eventually lose myself and fall asleep as you’d normally do. But suddenly, a thought crossed my mind: “What will happen to me after I die?”. At that very moment I felt sudden pressure in my neck and chest, it was almost suffocating. All other thoughts I had disappeared in an instant, and dark, vast space filled my mind. Nothing else was there, just me and nothingness. Thus, I lost all will to sleep, and I started developing this thought further and further.

Realistically, what does happen to your mind after you die? You could consider a concept of an afterlife, in one form or another, but I prefer to think that after dying you cease to exist. Existing in this case means that you, as a recently alive being, will not be able to think any further. Yes, of course, “you exist as long as people remember about you and things you did”, but existing like that does not allow you to change anything, that existence turns you into an object - how different from a book will you be? If we stick to this theory, then you can also derive the following: “It only matters what you do during your life, as after dying you will not be able to change anything nor will you be able to be praised/shamed for your deeds”, which can be simplified to “focus on present and be not afraid of the future”.

“Ah but you are wrong” you can say, “I think that something else happens after you die”, and maybe you are right, but here’s a story from my past. Couple of years ago I had to take a blood test, nothing special (except it was early in the morning compared to how it usually is but that’s not the point). They drew my blood, put the sample in a tube, and said I was free to go. I headed towards the exit, but then, suddenly, I started falling. The only thought that crossed my mind was “ah!” and then… nothing happened, just pitch black nothing. Second or two later I opened my eyes and saw that I was sitting on a bench in the hall near the exit. I had no idea what happened. In fact, I did not even realize that I had fainted - the last thing I remembered was heading towards the exit. People near me told me that I was out for 5-10 minutes, but to me that felt as if it was only one blink ago. From my experience this probably the closest feeling to death that you can have - last brief thought crosses your mind and… it is all over.

You have probably heard that “in your last moments life flashes before your eyes”, or maybe “you get a sense of peace/lightness while/before dying” and “you get to have an out-of-body experience shortly after dying or so”, but I don’t find these opinions to be very convincing. Probably there is a scientific explanation to this, after all, it is fairly easy to imagine all sorts of things even while being still alive, but now picture a dying brain and assume a rapid secretion of some chemicals in it and you get these visions but amplified, hence, sense of feeling light, memories of your past and/or pictures of the afterlife of your choice.

There is actually another theory that I like: assume that there is a specific period of time between your mind realizing that you are dying and your brain actually dying. Then, is it possible for brain to stretch this moment to eternity? What this means is that you will be alone with your thoughts and/or visions inside of your mind without realizing that you are already dead, kind of like creating own universe inside of your mind that cannot affect anyone but you. It sounds a bit unrealistic but I don’t find it to be that bad, and I probably should stick to it instead of believing in “nothingness”, but for the time being I believe that after death you just disappear, just like I experienced back then. However, can that experience considered inconclusive? Absolutely. Could this theory be an actual truth, or could something completely different be also true? Why not! Everyone has their own truth, and your truth is what you believe in and not what others think.

To conclude, just live in the moment. Do not think about dying too much. Yes, it will happen eventually, you might not even notice it. We all will die one day, so why not be happy now instead of living with regrets? For me death is not an escape from anything, I am as bound to die as everyone else (although observing the world after death like in killcam would’ve been fun), so this is just as much as I can do and think.