Surviving the death of my husband
“The loss of a loved one is suffering that must be overcome with courage. God is able to help us in our most difficult hour and will never let us drown in a pit of sorrow,” came this conclusion to Elena Brest, who became a widow just three months ago. This is how she talks about her experience.
A person died suddenly or died after a long illness - it is almost always an unexpected death in some sense. This is a crisis that can either be overcome with God's help, or one can succumb to depression and despair.
“My husband just recently went to be with the Lord. Everything happened very quickly, within a few days. Doctors could not determine the cause of his illness, and when the correct diagnosis was made, it was already too late - his aorta in the abdominal cavity burst and he bled to death. I struggled with death for four days, and I didn’t even know about it. Before Seryozha was taken to the hospital, he told me: “Thank you for everything, dear.” These were the last words I heard from him. My husband did not return from the hospital.
Sergei and I lived together for more than forty years. These were wonderful years, filled with joy and warmth of mutual understanding. Sergei was a good husband, my closest friend and a wonderful father to our three children. We both loved our jobs and each succeeded in our respective fields: he as an investigator, I as a translator.
We went to services together in a Christian church: first in Khabarovsk, and for the last three years in Sochi. Our home has always been open to Christians. I believed in 1992, Sergei ten years later. He walked towards faith slowly but consciously. In recent years, the Bible has become his reference book. He often read it and took some notes. But, most importantly, Sergei lived by the truths that he learned in Scripture. He truly loved God and people. He was also loved and respected in the church.
The unexpected death of Sergei came as a shock and a great shock to everyone who knew him. But he himself seemed to have a presentiment of something. Literally two weeks before his departure into eternity, a friend from the church asked Sergei about his health. “Everything is fine, but the pressure is crazy,” he answered with a smile. “Pressure is serious. Aren’t you afraid?” – the friend suddenly faltered and fell silent. "Of death? – Sergei guessed. -No I'm not afraid. I know where I will go after my earthly journey ends. After all, I am a believer.”
I, too, am a believer, and I understood that Sergei had gone to the Lord, but I could not immediately come to terms with his departure. For a month and a half I cried bitterly and was sad: it was so unusual and strange to be alone in an empty apartment. I ran away from this loneliness to the city, but even there it didn’t get any easier for me. Wherever I went - to the sea, or to the park - everything reminded me of my husband. Just recently we walked along Platanovaya Alley, took photographs near the fountains, and admired the amazing flora of Sochi. Sergei took photographs of flowers and sunsets. Everything was still so fresh in my memory that it caused unbearable pain.
Tears continuously flowed down my cheeks, my heart was breaking with melancholy, and my brain refused to accept this terrible information: my Seryozha was no more.
So day after day passed in sadness. Gradually I slipped into depression. Sometimes strange thoughts came into my head: “What if I get drunk now? My pain will become quieter." At home there was an open bottle of red wine, which we bought specifically for the breaking of bread, held once a month in the church. Neither my husband nor I ever drank alcohol. I have never even experienced a state of intoxication. But then suddenly the thought began to pester my brain: “get drunk and forget, get drunk and forget.” As a believer, I understood where such thoughts come from. By an effort of will, I forced myself to pray and asked God to help me resist temptation. “I will not sin, even to alleviate my condition,” I firmly told myself and threw the bottle of wine in the trash.
This incident made me wary. “It turns out that indulging in grief is dangerous - you can fall into sin and depression. Some even go crazy,” I thought.
From many years of Christian experience, I knew that only God can give true consolation. “Comforter in all your affliction” - this is what Scripture says about the Lord. Therefore, in prayer, I began to ask Him to console me and free me from the melancholy that was eating up my soul. Of course, God was waiting for this prayer. He told me that my severe grief was an unconscious expression of rebellion against His will. The Lord allowed Sergei to live sixty-two years, prepared him for eternity and took him away. There, in another existence, my husband is much better off than here on earth. He is in heavenly joy with the Lord. One day, at the right time, I will also meet my husband. God has His own plans for each of us, and we must come to terms with this fact. No matter how painful it may be.
This revelation brought about a wonderful change in me. Immediately after I “let go” of my husband and resigned myself to the will of God, complete peace came into my heart. I decided to live on, continue to work for the Lord and not lose heart. I think with God’s help I will succeed!
Elena Brest, Sochi
Motivation
Generate good, altruistic motivation for performing meditation, for example:
“I do this meditation to better understand the reality of death, to prepare myself for death by doing as many spiritual practices as possible while alive. This way I can be more useful to others
“I can help them overcome the fear of death, live life more wisely and die in greater peace.”
The earth element dissolves; a vision of a mirage appears
The earth element is the quality of solidity in our body.
When it dissolves, your body loses strength, becomes thinner and weaker, and you feel weak. You may feel like you are falling or sinking through the ground, and may find it difficult to sit up straight or hold anything.
Your body color fades and your cheeks become sunken.
In addition, vision becomes blurred; you find it difficult to open and close your eyes. These are the external signs of the first stage of the death process. The inner sign is the vision of a shimmering silver-blue mirage.
The air element dissolves; a vision of a dying flame appears
At this stage, you can no longer move your limbs; your body becomes motionless. Your mind becomes confused, losing awareness of the world around you. Everything is blurry. The feeling of contact with the outside world fades.
The senses of taste and touch disappear. You may have visions - frightening (as a result of bad actions committed during your life) or beautiful, joyful (as a result of good actions)...
Breathing becomes more and more difficult and then stops completely. Your last thoughts fade away, and an internal vision of a dim red-blue light or the last flickering of a candle flame that is about to go out appears.
Sense consciousness and gross thoughts have already disappeared at this stage, and during the subsequent four stages of the death process, the mind reaches increasingly subtler levels.
Where does guilt come from?
After the death of loved ones, many experience not only understandable depression and sadness.
Often people are simply overcome by sadness and depression, as well as a feeling of powerlessness from the inability to change the course of events and return the deceased. Many people tend to get bored and even talk to the dead, continuing an unfinished conversation. In some cases, people may suffer from feelings of guilt towards the deceased. To overcome this, first of all you need to try to understand what can cause such experiences, and how realistic it is to change the current situation.
Clear Light Vision
Now the mind has reached its most subtle level - the clear light of death. The emerging vision is like the autumn sky at dawn, completely clear, empty and full of clear, colorless light.
Keep your mind focused on this experience for as long as you can, without allowing your mind to be distracted by anything else. If he gets distracted, bring him back to the clear light experience. Remember that this is the purest, subtlest level of your mind...
When the clear light of death disappears, consciousness again goes through the stages of dissolution in reverse order: black vision, then red vision, and so on.
As soon as this process begins, a person finds himself in an intermediate state (Tib. Bardo), in a subtle body that is capable of instantly traveling to any point that a person thinks about, passing through walls, and so on, in search of a new birth. The body form in the bardo is the one that a person will take in his next rebirth.
Life in the intermediate state can last from a few moments to seven days, depending on whether a suitable birthplace can be found. Having failed to find it for seven days, the creature goes through a “little death,” briefly experiencing the eight stages of death, first in forward and then in reverse order, receiving a new birth in an intermediate state. In total, this stay in the intermediate state can last up to seven rebirths, or forty-nine days, during which a new place of rebirth is sought.
The water element dissolves; a vision of smoke appears
The element of water encompasses all the fluids in the body, as well as the quality of cohesion - what holds the individual parts together. When this element dissolves, you begin to feel dryness in your eyes, mouth and throat. It becomes difficult to move your tongue.
Pleasant and unpleasant sensations in the body weaken. Hearing weakens; ringing in the ears disappears. Your mind may become foggy, feel frustrated, or become nervous.
You experience an inner vision of haze with swirling clouds of smoke.
Dedication
Dedicate the merits of meditation to being able to develop wisdom, compassion and other qualities and realizations that will allow you to free yourself from the cycle of death and rebirth so that you can help other beings also achieve liberation and true, lasting peace and happiness.
Attention!!! Consult an experienced lama before practicing this meditation.
The fire element disintegrates; a vision of sparks appears
The fire element is the heat in our body. At this point, your mouth and nose are completely dry. Body heat begins to fade, usually in the direction from the legs and arms to the heart. You are no longer able to eat, drink or digest anything. Your mind alternates between becoming clear and cloudy.
You are no longer able to remember the names of people, even relatives and friends; you may not even recognize them. Your sense of smell weakens and breathing becomes difficult:
inhalations become very weak, and exhalations become stronger and longer. You experience an inner vision, like sparks or fireflies dancing in space.
Meditation
The process of dying involves the gradual loss of physical, sensory and mental functions as the activity of the nervous system ceases from the outskirts to the depths.
Imagine dying a natural death and experiencing the following eight stages as the components of your mind and body gradually dissolve. At each stage, both external and internal signs arise. Try to imagine these experiences as clearly as possible.
In the first four stages of the death process, the mind is still at the gross level. The gross level of mind includes our thoughts and sense perceptions. As you progress through the first four stages, these factors gradually weaken.
