Acceptance. Fighting is for when there's a chance. Do anything you enjoy, say goodbye to anyone who you want to know about your passing. Be free of obligations; they're for the living. Set down...
Acceptance. Fighting is for when there's a chance. Do anything you enjoy, say goodbye to anyone who you want to know about your passing. Be free of obligations; they're for the living. Set down your burdens. What do you want to do? If your time is just weeks away, there's little left that should stop you.
I've thought a lot about my own death since I was very young. Even still, I don't know if I have learned anything that will really help you. Maybe one thing. You mention not leaving behind any...
I've thought a lot about my own death since I was very young. Even still, I don't know if I have learned anything that will really help you. Maybe one thing.
You mention not leaving behind any form of legacy, but that's not really true. Even if you are the most forgettable person on the planet and people immediately forget you ever existed the moment you're gone, you had an effect. The world is as it is today because you were in it. The memory of people is both fragile and fickle, so it really doesn't really matter too much if people forget you; your real legacy is the people who were affected by you. All of the tiny things you have ever done add up even if you cannot see it for yourself.
To add to this, we are all rocks in the flow of time. Anybody who has been kayaking can attest to how much impact just one rock has in a river flow, big or small. And even the pebbles have a...
To add to this, we are all rocks in the flow of time. Anybody who has been kayaking can attest to how much impact just one rock has in a river flow, big or small. And even the pebbles have a cumulative effect. It's impossible to truly know how much impact one rock has on the overall flow, but it does have an impact and that carries on to the next rock, and the next, and the next, and so on.
I've heard that emo phrase of "you die again when somebody says your name for the last time" or whatever, but I disagree. One's impact lives on forever in some small way, no matter what.
Speaking of which, I think it's worth mentioning that /r/SuicideWatch maintains a worldwide Suicide Hotline directory: https://www.reddit.com/r/SuicideWatch/wiki/hotlines So even for people that...
Thank you for trusting this community with something so important. By sharing your experience with us, you have already made an invaluable contribution to the universe. Thank you again. It may...
Thank you for trusting this community with something so important. By sharing your experience with us, you have already made an invaluable contribution to the universe. Thank you again.
It may help you to recognize we are all inevitably dying. The time difference is immaterial. That you can see your end more clearly is a gift, we would all do well to view our own ends with such immediate attention. Another gift you have given us.
Ultimately, we must relinquish our experience the same way we relinquish a thought during meditation. Delight in its transience, thank it for its brief formation, and gently smile as it drifts apart.
Without knowing more, I'd say: If you want to travel, and your reasons for being unable to do so are purely financial, then perhaps it's possible for you to get some 'risky' lines of credit or...
Without knowing more, I'd say: If you want to travel, and your reasons for being unable to do so are purely financial, then perhaps it's possible for you to get some 'risky' lines of credit or loans. I've never known anyone in that situation before so I can't say if creditors might care about one's health, but it may be worth looking into.
Otherwise, if I were in a similar situation I'd talk to people. Live vicariously through their stories and experiences, and frankly let myself live in willful ignorance. Maybe I'd write something (even if it's just a few poems or angry blog posts) then submit them to some big repositories of written works. AO3, web archives; in that situation I might even print a few out. Just something that would linger for an indeterminate amount of time after I'd be gone. A little selfishness isn't unwarranted IMO, especially if it won't hurt anyone else.
If I think of anything else, I'll come back and edit my post.
I want you to know that I recognize your name here from conversation and you will be remembered. You have helped build this small idealistic community. The Book of Joy is a good one about death...
I want you to know that I recognize your name here from conversation and you will be remembered. You have helped build this small idealistic community.
The Book of Joy is a good one about death and dying I think, by Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama. But I second the earlier suggestion to teach what you care about and leave a video archive.
Part of me is really hesitant to give any advice because it's so outside my realm of experience (and probably most folks) but I can give perspective on how I'd approach it. This is really tough...
Part of me is really hesitant to give any advice because it's so outside my realm of experience (and probably most folks) but I can give perspective on how I'd approach it. This is really tough
First I wouldn't do anything rash right now. Weeks or months isn't long in the grand scheme of things but it is compared to a day. I have a saying in my relationship: 2 minutes rather than 2 hours. It just means taking 2 minutes to clarify a friction point or prep for something can usually save 2 hours of arguing. All that to say, today is a day to take everything in, start the grieving process, and just try to be ok - as hard as that may be to do. If you have any movies or tv shows that put you in a relaxed mood try those out, for me it's Great British Bake Off. If you do have people in your life who you can share this with who can just provide support, and just the support you want, I'd reach out to them too.
Day 2, I'd learn more about the source of dying and if possible with a professional (like a doctor if this is medical). Is it a sudden thing? Can it be treated? Is it degenerative? Knowing these will let you decide what you want to do and what next steps to take. If it will be sudden, without cure, but not degenerative then you can try to experience things you've been putting off. If it's degenerative or can be treated that's another path. If you can flesh out your options during this period then you'll have a better idea of the next week-months.
The next important factor is finances. If you have money to burn then go wild. If not just find the things you enjoy locally and dive in. As others have said you may even be able to get a short term loan to indulge in things, just figure out what your timeline looks like first. Alternatively, if there are folks you'd like to support post mortem maybe look into getting a life insurance policy.
All that so say those are my thoughts as someone not going through it with possibly a very different perspective on life. I rwish you the best of luck navigating the next weeks/months and feel free to reach out. I also want to say I've really enjoyed your contributions to Tildes and perspectives in previous threads.
I have a friend who is a hospital chaplain. He deals with the questions you're asking every week, in a variety of situations. Doesn't matter if the enquirer is a person of faith or not, his goal...
I have a friend who is a hospital chaplain. He deals with the questions you're asking every week, in a variety of situations. Doesn't matter if the enquirer is a person of faith or not, his goal is to be a comfort, to listen, and sometimes to share thoughts that may be helpful. I think talking to someone who has walked this path many times could be helpful, and I'm sure that just about every hospital has a chaplain or knows how to reach one.
I hope you find much peace and grace whatever you choose.
That sounds like a very frustrating situation to be in. I don't think I have much to add in terms of making an impact, but I have read that there is a lot of evidence that psychedelics like...
That sounds like a very frustrating situation to be in. I don't think I have much to add in terms of making an impact, but I have read that there is a lot of evidence that psychedelics like mushrooms are very helpful for people with terminal illness: https://www.readersdigest.ca/health/conditions/magic-mushrooms-terminal-cancer/
I would say it's very worth a shot in hopefully making you feel better!
@buddhism I definitely recommend magic mushrooms for many reasons. I don't really have any influence here and I'm sure if I try to change your mind you'll only resist the advice. Magic mushrooms...
@buddhism I definitely recommend magic mushrooms for many reasons. I don't really have any influence here and I'm sure if I try to change your mind you'll only resist the advice.
Magic mushrooms will help you make the most of your time, regardless of whether you intend to or hope for a change of mind. At the very least it's an interesting experience and something everyone should try. You may gain a sense a peace and keep your decision. Whatever happens you'll be in control. Definitely look up a nice guide on how to get the right setting. Doing the mushrooms in nature is strongly recommended, but having comforts nearby (a hot shower, food, water) is important.
Software engineering is my main hobby and main purpose in this world. It's kinda one of the main reasons i feel sad about leaving this early because due to many factors it takes me an incredibly...
Software engineering is my main hobby and main purpose in this world. It's kinda one of the main reasons i feel sad about leaving this early because due to many factors it takes me an incredibly long time to get much done despite working for so many hours, yet i come up with lots of ideas for projects. I like coding for fun but im not sure that it will even contribute to humanity in any way.
Would you find joy in passing that info on to new developers? Could make videos of yourself teaching code basics. Maybe use one of those project ideas as the vessel for teaching. Build one of the...
Would you find joy in passing that info on to new developers? Could make videos of yourself teaching code basics. Maybe use one of those project ideas as the vessel for teaching. Build one of the ideas and explain the process as you go.
I like writing code too and I also struggle a lot. Executive function difficulties and physical symptoms like gut tightness. When I was younger my head would run in all sorts of directions about...
Exemplary
I like writing code too and I also struggle a lot. Executive function difficulties and physical symptoms like gut tightness. When I was younger my head would run in all sorts of directions about what I could make, specific algorithms, how I could implement them, etc. My thoughts far outpaced what I could actually do.
I don't know whether it's like this for you too, but I'll ramble on for a bit about my own experiences. I'm sorry if this isn't relevant.
e.g. I'd spend hours trying to figure out what the heck some error message was trying to say. It's telling me about line X, but I see nothing wrong there. Sometimes it's actually something I keep overlooking in line X (like a subtle typo). Sometimes it's an error in an earlier line Y but the compiler reports a problem at X. And sometimes it's actually two mistakes, that one and another that might be in a different line. And my working memory was a mess. After I realized the second mistake and fixed that, I might have forgotten what the first was actually all about.
Even scrolling through long sections of code could make me forget about things like what I was looking for in the first place. Coding was fun as a theoretical activity, but I couldn't properly come to grips with the practical side. I spent a lot of time overthinking too. It took me an incredibly long time to do very little.
It triggered a lot of anxiety and frustration (my gut tightness when working on challenging things is I believe psychological in origin, from since childhood). I kept expecting that I should be able to do better, kept forcing my way through them, just fighting the discomfort, trying to keep more and more in my head. That didn't work, only made things worse and the triggers and discomfort became stronger the next time I tried doing those things.
So I also shut down a lot. Easiest way to get rid of the discomfort was to stop trying to do those things that caused it. I'd play games, watch movies and anime, lie down etc. I'd tell myself "this is what I can manage now, and this is still meaningful". That avoided the problems and didn't address them.
The reality is that human minds don't work the way I tried to force mine to. The wrong circuits are activated when you try to force it, whether it's forcing it through discomfort, hypervigilance, anxiety, depression, etc. You learn best when you're calm and you can't force calm, you achieve that by giving yourself time and space and getting into a calm state of mind for learning. And you have to allow yourself time to learn, to get to the point where the big things you want to do are manageable because you've allowed yourself to do the smaller things first, making the next steps more manageable.
It also took me a long time to have the calm and clarity to identify some of my confusion and difficulties like in the above paragraphs. I couldn't see them clearly while forcibly struggling with them.
I don't know your circumstances, don't know why you don't have much time left. But with whatever time and space you have, would there be something more manageable you could try to do, that's still meaningful for you? Maybe a part of one of your ideas. I had lots of ideas in the past for games, for the most part I've only created parts of them. A battle system, a way to handle dragging and dropping stuff, some algorithms, etc. I think my battle system turned out interesting, even though I didn't turn it into a full game. Maybe exploring different ways of coding, just experiencing more about what writing code can be like. I gave up struggling with C++ after accepting I had too many difficulties with it and spent time exploring other languages like Python, that also turned out to be interesting and meaningful.
I wrote some documentation for a software library I was using, that was meaningful too.
If you don't mind sharing, which ideas were you most excited about? What language(s) do you use?
GitHub, in partnership with a few other organizations, continuously archives public repositories that they host. You could upload all your in-progress projects and project ideas to GitHub and make...
GitHub, in partnership with a few other organizations, continuously archives public repositories that they host. You could upload all your in-progress projects and project ideas to GitHub and make sure your repos have not opted out of the archive program (it's opt-in by default). You could also release them to public domain by adding or switching to a license like Unlicense, which may help with letting go and accepting that you're leaving your work behind.
You know, they might get picked up by an LLM or two and seed the thoughts of future generations of humans. I write this with a slight tongue-in-cheek tone, but also I hadn't considered that I myself might genuinely find comfort in the thought that my code getting used to train LLMs could be part of how I might leave my legacy behind. I, for one, also just use GitHub search to look up how other people solved certain problems fairly often, so your code being searchable in GitHub could already be helpful, even if there isn't much or isn't finished as a whole.
You’ve left a legacy in my mind as well, the one time I open this app in a long while and I saw your post. I now know your story and I hope the more philosophically versed in this thread can help...
You’ve left a legacy in my mind as well, the one time I open this app in a long while and I saw your post. I now know your story and I hope the more philosophically versed in this thread can help you with coping
Acceptance. Fighting is for when there's a chance. Do anything you enjoy, say goodbye to anyone who you want to know about your passing. Be free of obligations; they're for the living. Set down your burdens. What do you want to do? If your time is just weeks away, there's little left that should stop you.
I've thought a lot about my own death since I was very young. Even still, I don't know if I have learned anything that will really help you. Maybe one thing.
You mention not leaving behind any form of legacy, but that's not really true. Even if you are the most forgettable person on the planet and people immediately forget you ever existed the moment you're gone, you had an effect. The world is as it is today because you were in it. The memory of people is both fragile and fickle, so it really doesn't really matter too much if people forget you; your real legacy is the people who were affected by you. All of the tiny things you have ever done add up even if you cannot see it for yourself.
To add to this, we are all rocks in the flow of time. Anybody who has been kayaking can attest to how much impact just one rock has in a river flow, big or small. And even the pebbles have a cumulative effect. It's impossible to truly know how much impact one rock has on the overall flow, but it does have an impact and that carries on to the next rock, and the next, and the next, and so on.
I've heard that emo phrase of "you die again when somebody says your name for the last time" or whatever, but I disagree. One's impact lives on forever in some small way, no matter what.
Speaking of which, I think it's worth mentioning that /r/SuicideWatch maintains a worldwide Suicide Hotline directory: https://www.reddit.com/r/SuicideWatch/wiki/hotlines
So even for people that don't have a therapist, or loved ones they feel they can talk to, there are places that can be called for help, @buddhism.
Thank you for trusting this community with something so important. By sharing your experience with us, you have already made an invaluable contribution to the universe. Thank you again.
It may help you to recognize we are all inevitably dying. The time difference is immaterial. That you can see your end more clearly is a gift, we would all do well to view our own ends with such immediate attention. Another gift you have given us.
Ultimately, we must relinquish our experience the same way we relinquish a thought during meditation. Delight in its transience, thank it for its brief formation, and gently smile as it drifts apart.
Peace to you in your journey to the other shore.
Without knowing more, I'd say: If you want to travel, and your reasons for being unable to do so are purely financial, then perhaps it's possible for you to get some 'risky' lines of credit or loans. I've never known anyone in that situation before so I can't say if creditors might care about one's health, but it may be worth looking into.
Otherwise, if I were in a similar situation I'd talk to people. Live vicariously through their stories and experiences, and frankly let myself live in willful ignorance. Maybe I'd write something (even if it's just a few poems or angry blog posts) then submit them to some big repositories of written works. AO3, web archives; in that situation I might even print a few out. Just something that would linger for an indeterminate amount of time after I'd be gone. A little selfishness isn't unwarranted IMO, especially if it won't hurt anyone else.
If I think of anything else, I'll come back and edit my post.
I want you to know that I recognize your name here from conversation and you will be remembered. You have helped build this small idealistic community.
The Book of Joy is a good one about death and dying I think, by Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama. But I second the earlier suggestion to teach what you care about and leave a video archive.
Best wishes. We all succumb eventually
Part of me is really hesitant to give any advice because it's so outside my realm of experience (and probably most folks) but I can give perspective on how I'd approach it. This is really tough
First I wouldn't do anything rash right now. Weeks or months isn't long in the grand scheme of things but it is compared to a day. I have a saying in my relationship: 2 minutes rather than 2 hours. It just means taking 2 minutes to clarify a friction point or prep for something can usually save 2 hours of arguing. All that to say, today is a day to take everything in, start the grieving process, and just try to be ok - as hard as that may be to do. If you have any movies or tv shows that put you in a relaxed mood try those out, for me it's Great British Bake Off. If you do have people in your life who you can share this with who can just provide support, and just the support you want, I'd reach out to them too.
Day 2, I'd learn more about the source of dying and if possible with a professional (like a doctor if this is medical). Is it a sudden thing? Can it be treated? Is it degenerative? Knowing these will let you decide what you want to do and what next steps to take. If it will be sudden, without cure, but not degenerative then you can try to experience things you've been putting off. If it's degenerative or can be treated that's another path. If you can flesh out your options during this period then you'll have a better idea of the next week-months.
The next important factor is finances. If you have money to burn then go wild. If not just find the things you enjoy locally and dive in. As others have said you may even be able to get a short term loan to indulge in things, just figure out what your timeline looks like first. Alternatively, if there are folks you'd like to support post mortem maybe look into getting a life insurance policy.
All that so say those are my thoughts as someone not going through it with possibly a very different perspective on life. I rwish you the best of luck navigating the next weeks/months and feel free to reach out. I also want to say I've really enjoyed your contributions to Tildes and perspectives in previous threads.
I have a friend who is a hospital chaplain. He deals with the questions you're asking every week, in a variety of situations. Doesn't matter if the enquirer is a person of faith or not, his goal is to be a comfort, to listen, and sometimes to share thoughts that may be helpful. I think talking to someone who has walked this path many times could be helpful, and I'm sure that just about every hospital has a chaplain or knows how to reach one.
I hope you find much peace and grace whatever you choose.
That sounds like a very frustrating situation to be in. I don't think I have much to add in terms of making an impact, but I have read that there is a lot of evidence that psychedelics like mushrooms are very helpful for people with terminal illness: https://www.readersdigest.ca/health/conditions/magic-mushrooms-terminal-cancer/
I would say it's very worth a shot in hopefully making you feel better!
@buddhism I definitely recommend magic mushrooms for many reasons. I don't really have any influence here and I'm sure if I try to change your mind you'll only resist the advice.
Magic mushrooms will help you make the most of your time, regardless of whether you intend to or hope for a change of mind. At the very least it's an interesting experience and something everyone should try. You may gain a sense a peace and keep your decision. Whatever happens you'll be in control. Definitely look up a nice guide on how to get the right setting. Doing the mushrooms in nature is strongly recommended, but having comforts nearby (a hot shower, food, water) is important.
What do you find meaningful? What brings you joy?
Software engineering is my main hobby and main purpose in this world. It's kinda one of the main reasons i feel sad about leaving this early because due to many factors it takes me an incredibly long time to get much done despite working for so many hours, yet i come up with lots of ideas for projects. I like coding for fun but im not sure that it will even contribute to humanity in any way.
Would you find joy in passing that info on to new developers? Could make videos of yourself teaching code basics. Maybe use one of those project ideas as the vessel for teaching. Build one of the ideas and explain the process as you go.
I think i might hopefully do something along those lines, thanks very much for the advice
I like writing code too and I also struggle a lot. Executive function difficulties and physical symptoms like gut tightness. When I was younger my head would run in all sorts of directions about what I could make, specific algorithms, how I could implement them, etc. My thoughts far outpaced what I could actually do.
I don't know whether it's like this for you too, but I'll ramble on for a bit about my own experiences. I'm sorry if this isn't relevant.
e.g. I'd spend hours trying to figure out what the heck some error message was trying to say. It's telling me about line X, but I see nothing wrong there. Sometimes it's actually something I keep overlooking in line X (like a subtle typo). Sometimes it's an error in an earlier line Y but the compiler reports a problem at X. And sometimes it's actually two mistakes, that one and another that might be in a different line. And my working memory was a mess. After I realized the second mistake and fixed that, I might have forgotten what the first was actually all about.
Even scrolling through long sections of code could make me forget about things like what I was looking for in the first place. Coding was fun as a theoretical activity, but I couldn't properly come to grips with the practical side. I spent a lot of time overthinking too. It took me an incredibly long time to do very little.
It triggered a lot of anxiety and frustration (my gut tightness when working on challenging things is I believe psychological in origin, from since childhood). I kept expecting that I should be able to do better, kept forcing my way through them, just fighting the discomfort, trying to keep more and more in my head. That didn't work, only made things worse and the triggers and discomfort became stronger the next time I tried doing those things.
So I also shut down a lot. Easiest way to get rid of the discomfort was to stop trying to do those things that caused it. I'd play games, watch movies and anime, lie down etc. I'd tell myself "this is what I can manage now, and this is still meaningful". That avoided the problems and didn't address them.
The reality is that human minds don't work the way I tried to force mine to. The wrong circuits are activated when you try to force it, whether it's forcing it through discomfort, hypervigilance, anxiety, depression, etc. You learn best when you're calm and you can't force calm, you achieve that by giving yourself time and space and getting into a calm state of mind for learning. And you have to allow yourself time to learn, to get to the point where the big things you want to do are manageable because you've allowed yourself to do the smaller things first, making the next steps more manageable.
It also took me a long time to have the calm and clarity to identify some of my confusion and difficulties like in the above paragraphs. I couldn't see them clearly while forcibly struggling with them.
I don't know your circumstances, don't know why you don't have much time left. But with whatever time and space you have, would there be something more manageable you could try to do, that's still meaningful for you? Maybe a part of one of your ideas. I had lots of ideas in the past for games, for the most part I've only created parts of them. A battle system, a way to handle dragging and dropping stuff, some algorithms, etc. I think my battle system turned out interesting, even though I didn't turn it into a full game. Maybe exploring different ways of coding, just experiencing more about what writing code can be like. I gave up struggling with C++ after accepting I had too many difficulties with it and spent time exploring other languages like Python, that also turned out to be interesting and meaningful.
I wrote some documentation for a software library I was using, that was meaningful too.
If you don't mind sharing, which ideas were you most excited about? What language(s) do you use?
GitHub, in partnership with a few other organizations, continuously archives public repositories that they host. You could upload all your in-progress projects and project ideas to GitHub and make sure your repos have not opted out of the archive program (it's opt-in by default). You could also release them to public domain by adding or switching to a license like Unlicense, which may help with letting go and accepting that you're leaving your work behind.
You know, they might get picked up by an LLM or two and seed the thoughts of future generations of humans. I write this with a slight tongue-in-cheek tone, but also I hadn't considered that I myself might genuinely find comfort in the thought that my code getting used to train LLMs could be part of how I might leave my legacy behind. I, for one, also just use GitHub search to look up how other people solved certain problems fairly often, so your code being searchable in GitHub could already be helpful, even if there isn't much or isn't finished as a whole.
You’ve left a legacy in my mind as well, the one time I open this app in a long while and I saw your post. I now know your story and I hope the more philosophically versed in this thread can help you with coping