This is the first of a series of short posts entitled “Meditations on Time.” In this series I will explore some of my thoughts and experiences concerning time and the gospel.
Living forever hasn’t always been a pleasant thought for me.
I still remember when the notion of living forever first dawned on me. I was probably 4 or 5 years old. Prior to this time, I had believed in life after death, but I never had really thought about what that would be like. I remember having some kind of conversation with my older sister, and she said something about how in the next life time never ends. That idea was so foreign, I couldn’t even begin to fathom it. I asked my mom if this were really true, and she said it was. When I expressed that it sounded so weird to me, my mom replied, “Well, wouldn’t it be weirder if your life just suddenly ended?” I had to admit that I of course didn’t like that outcome either.
Therein was my dilemma. Both possible outcomes — living forever and ceasing to exist — frightened me.
I can still remember burying my head in the seat of my dad’s recliner and contemplating the deepness of eternity. “What would it be like to have one day … followed by another day … and another day … and another day … forever? I was going to go crazy!”
“Wouldn’t we get bored?” I protested. Mom answered by saying we’d be making worlds — how would that be boring?
Well, of course it won’t be boring at first. But forever? Even Disneyland would be boring forever!
Around this same time, the idea of having no beginning also began to sink in. This idea, of course, also made no sense. But — I could handle it because it was all in the past and I couldn’t remember it anyway.
Maybe that’s the key, I thought. Maybe there’s a way to live forever but without the dauntingness of forever before you. Maybe life is a continual series of reincarnations or something. Maybe after this life there will be another veil and future experiences like mortality with clearly defined ends. I think I could handle that.
But maybe there’s not. Probably not. The reincarnation idea didn’t really jive with what I knew about the plan of salvation.
I resolved that I just wasn’t going to think about it. I was just going to live in the present and wait until after this life to worry about the burden of eternity.
Let’s just hope I live a long time, I thought.
To be continued …
Filed under: Religious Experience, Theology | Tagged: death, eternal life, existence, existentialism, Heavenly Father, immortality, Latter-day Saints, LDS Church, metaphysics, Mormons, mortality, plan of salvation, pre-mortal existence, Theology, time
I remember having a similar experience when I was about 11. I remember being particularly bored one day and thinking, is this what forever is like?
Ok, so this is where I reveal my long-held secret: I don’t want to live forever. Haven’t wanted to for the last two decades, during which time I’ve raised a family, held many church positions, and continued to develop my testimony. I have no doubt that there is an afterlife, I would just rather pass on existing after I’ve fulfilled my covenants and responsibilities here. I know I only have Brigham Young’s support on the possibility of the disassociation of my component “intelligences” back to the intelligence soup to later create other spirits, but I like the idea for me. I know, it’s creepy. A dissolving into Nirvana (Nibbana) would be cool too.
In a fantasy series which ran for many years in Catalyst Magazine, the main character opines:
“Today I feel powerfully dismantled. There’s a fuzzy high happening, a taking apart of the brain’s tendencies. Nothing could give more joy. I tire of the effort of “Jenny”, of the “I” jockeying for it’s place in things. What would it be, I imagine, to truly exist as an endless shifting configuration of possibilities? The personality, being dismantled, would float like happy little electron boats in a cloud of relative tangibilities. The concepts of survival and identity would float away like so much dead seaweed. What great pleasure, what intense and unbounded pleasure to imagine one’s complete and utter annihilation!
Don’t be afraid of existing forever. You’re already doing it. Seems OK so far.
larryco_,
Well, I encourage you to stick with this series of posts.
Maybe something I say might change your mind — or at least help you to see the idea of living forever differently …
One of my favorite concepts, as illustrated by one of my favorite quotes from fiction, paraphrased:
If anyone ever learns everything, it will be found that he is the Most High God, and always has been.
From The Wizard by Gene Wolfe.
A similar concept is discussed in The Neverending Story by Michael Ende (which is terribly underserved by the movie, by the way).
As soon as we do anything that is sealed by eternal authority, it becomes eternal reality not only from that point forward, but backward as well. This is how Christ’s atonement is retroactive, as well as how eternal families and progression to Godhood work, in my opinion. It provides the paradoxical glue to many LDS doctrines. I also think it makes your idea of living one day at a time very, very relevant.
I’m excited for the rest of this series, Dennis, because this is a topic that I love and feel strongly about.
Dennis et al,
You might enjoy reading Dreaming Beyond Death, a book about dreams during the period just before death.
http://www.amazon.com/Dreaming-Beyond-Death-Pre-Death-Visions/dp/0807077208
Out of stock, but used copies are available.
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Wow, I thought I was the only one in the world to have this fear.
When I was a child, this fear had a huge affect on me. But my way of dealing with it was by reading the Bible and realizing that God only has good plans for His children. He would never do something to harm them, such as make them live forever if it wasn’t beneficial. So basically, if God is good, then what He is doing, giving eternal life, must be good. Also, why would Jesus die on the cross and do everything He did to give us eternal life if it wasn’t meant to be something good for us?
I see the last post was a few days ago so hopefully the thread will keep going as this is a fear I had contemplated, not for myself, but for the damned. I do not fear living forever. as we know God’s time is one great eternal round, however time as we know it is linear. When we die the ends of the linear time line we have sampled here on earth will be joined at the ends, as it should be and all things will be connected, past, present and future. God has slowed time for man to equal one thousand years to His one day. By doing this he placed the veil over our minds at a certain point in time (birth) and gave us a corresponding axis to refer to as “time”- that is the rotation of the planets around the sun. Before we came here we had no concept of day and night, a beginning and an end, but by providing a physical example of the sun rise and sunset we awere able to adjust to the new perception of time, one with a reliable beginning and end, like birth and death, and sunrises and sunsets. Therefore our “PERCEPTION” of time was changed with our birth, not the essence of eternity or eternal life. WE ARE ETERNAL/ SPIRITUAL BEINGS HAVING HUMAN EXPERIENCES, NOT HUMAN BEINGS HAVING SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES.
The thing I have always wondered about is the state of the DAMNED, or those who are now and those who will be cast into outer darkness. As Jesus Christ has said it is better that they were never born at all- so I wonder how do they endure an eternity of torment? The only thing I have ever heard about it is that is is actually better for them to burn in the eternal flames of hell and the fiery knowledge of their sins, that to be in the presence of God, because the latter would be unbearable for them. Now that’s what I call DEEP!
Michelle,
I interpret the “it is better that they were never born” phrase to mean that of all of God’s creations, only the sons of perdition do not progress in relation to pre-mortality. All other beings, those who are consigned to any degree of glory, are better off (i.e., more progressed) than they were in pre-mortality.