Let’s take stock.
I started Getting Direction with, as its focus, what I think has been formative.
That remains true; I feel it remains valid.
Part Two had escape as its focus. It’s an interesting aspect of life.
But as I read back all that I’ve thought about it, I think what I’m left with is a desire to reject both death and escape as being big deals.
Stick with me.
I’m sure escaping, one way or another, will come back as a subject, as a desire. I can look at that again, as it arises.
I’m not a fool. I’ve known enough death, both professionally and close-up and personal, to know a little of how much it hurts.
And, inevitably, there are plenty more deaths to come. But I can’t stop that. All I can do is react.
And I’m increasingly thinking that all I can sensibly do is learn from that inevitability. Learn from the deaths. And move on as best I can.
No-one gains if death grinds you down.
The focus should be the legacy of all the deaths experienced in a life. And it is up to you and me to forge that legacy for ourselves. To make it positive.
So, yes, let’s move on as best we can. And move on equipped as well as we can be – aware, questioning, learning, building, relishing.
Onwards. Ever onwards. To Part Three.
Arguably … from perspectives outside the Western, often, the need to be comfortable with death is a given. That is not to belittle loss. It is to be realistic about the finite nature of life. What we should be asking is where the Western attitude comes from, and why.

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