When I was younger, around 19 or so, I contemplated death for the first time. I grew up religious, Catholic, and always believed that you go on after death. Thi

When I was younger, around 19 or so, I contemplated death for the first time. I grew up religious, Catholic, and always believed that you go on after death. This was the first time I imagined the truth. It stunned me. I couldn’t sleep. I could NOT imagine non-existence. It terrofied me. In the next few years I learned more about the world and grew far more comfortable with my place in it. I don’t feel nearly as puzzled about nonexistence as I used to. For me, I see myself as a cell in a greater body — humanity — and I see humanity as part of an even greater whole, the universe. Does a single cell worry about its fate after death? No. It merely does what it is supposed to do, does it well if it can, and then ends gracefully when its time has come. I feel the same way about my own life. I am part of a whole, humanity at one level, the universe itself at another. I do my best with the limited time I have; I do my duty; and then I die. I have grown quite comfortable with this view of life and death over the years. It gives nonexistence found at the end of life its appropriate meaning. It is the natural end of a temporal life.