A childhood encounter with death placed a question in my heart that would guide my lifelong search for the meaning of life.
The summer I was fourteen, I went swimming with a friend in a reservoir near our village. We were playing happily in the water when he suddenly began struggling and disappeared beneath the surface.
I dove into the water and pulled him out. Then, I lifted his limp body onto my back and ran toward the village as fast as I could. By the time I reached his home and laid him down in the yard, he had stopped breathing.
All the strength left my body. Later, I lay alone behind our house on a pile of bean husks, shivering. The shock made me physically ill, and I remained in bed for nearly a month.
My body eventually recovered, but something within me had changed.
When Death Became Personal
Before that day, death had been an idea. I knew that people died, but I had never felt the reality of death so close to me.
After losing my friend, I could no longer stop thinking about it. One day, I would die. My parents would die. Everyone I knew and everything I could see would someday disappear.
A question began following me everywhere:
Why do we live if we are all going to die?
I watched my friends study diligently and prepare for their futures. I could not understand their motivation. Why work so hard? Why strive for success if everything ultimately ends?
At night, I looked toward the sky with anger and frustration. I had been born without asking to be born, yet no one had explained why I was here. Life had been given to me without instructions, and death seemed to be waiting at the end.
These were heavy questions for a fourteen-year-old. I did not know how to answer them, and the adults around me could not give me answers that satisfied my heart. Still, the questions would not leave me.
The Question Became a Path
Looking back, death was my first teacher about life. My friend’s death did not immediately give me wisdom or a clear direction. It broke open the ordinary assumptions through which I had been living. I could no longer accept that we are born, pursue the goals placed before us, and eventually disappear without understanding why.
That experience became the beginning of a search. I wanted to know whether life had a purpose beyond survival and success. I wanted to understand who or what within us experiences life. Most of all, I wanted to know how a human being should live when death is certain.
The question changed as I grew older, but it never disappeared. Sometimes it became quieter as daily responsibilities demanded my attention. Then a loss, a struggle, or a moment in nature would bring it back again.
What is this life for?
Many of us carry some form of this question, even when we do not speak it aloud. It may arise after someone we love dies. It may come when we face illness, grow older, or realize that time is passing more quickly than we expected. It may appear in a quiet moment when the goals we have pursued no longer feel sufficient.
We often try to push the question away because it makes us uncomfortable. Yet, when we remain with it, the question can begin to clarify our lives.
What deserves our limited time? What do we still want to express, repair, or complete? What kind of person do we want to be while we are here?
I have carried these questions since I was fourteen. They have shaped my training, my teaching, and my efforts to understand human consciousness. They are also part of the long journey that led me to write The Tao of Dying Well.
I cannot say that the pain of losing my friend was good. I can say that his death awakened a question that kept me searching. That question gradually became a compass, pointing me toward a deeper understanding of life. Perhaps the questions we fear most are sometimes the ones that can guide us most honestly.
When we allow ourselves to face death, we begin to see more clearly what we want to do with the life that is here now.
Editor’s Note: Ilchi Lee’s new book, The Tao of Dying Well, is currently available for pre-order. Learn more at TaoOfDyingWell.com.
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