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I think that when the brain dies, and the neurons stop firing, the consciousness ceases to exist. Since I think that what we call "the soul" is actually a romanticized view of our individual consciousness, I don't think there is anything after death. Our bodies decay and all the matter and energy that was momentarily organized into a person, disperses and is recycled into other creatures, plants, minerals, etc.

This does not mean that I don't fear death. I don't want to cease being. I just don't fear what comes after death.

you come back and do it all over again until you get it right

I believe that after we die we wait in the Summerland until we are reincarnated. And so the cycle will continue over and over and over....

Lao Tzu, the author of the Tao Te Ching, has this to say on death:

"The body comes to its ending,
but there is nothing to fear."

And it's true. I think he was also the one who said that we are our bodies, and that talk of life after death was nonsense. I find it impressive that he would believe both of those things. I was really afraid of death for a while some years ago, but this helped me get over it. There is nothing about death to fear. It's just something else that happens. Maybe you'll see it coming, but even if you do, you--as you are, now--will never experience death. If you believe in an afterlife, it won't be an end. It will just be a transformation, and there's no way to know what it will be like. If you don't believe in an afterlife, you'll never know. Once you've ended, you won't be there to know that you don't exist anymore. If your consciousness doesn't exist, eternity will be faster than any amount of time was when you could count it. At the end of eternity will be another mystery. Maybe time goes in circles--like negative and positive infinity meeting on a graph--and everything would happen again. Even if the afterlife turns out to be miserable and it went on forever, there's the chance of forever itself ending, too. The only thing there is to do is to think about it in every way you know how, and discuss it like we are here. You should try out a couple of your own ideas. Ask more questions. If you're afraid of it because you don't know what it is, you should try to find out what it might be. Talk to people who seem to have gotten over their fears. I think the only thing I'm afraid of now is the possibility of leaving things undone before I go--things that really matter. There's no help for that, though, either. I'm working on getting over that. I think that if one goes towards one's death with as much peace of mind and quiet assurance as one can, whatever happens will not be so bad after all.

There is a Buddhist theory that my father told me of, where our individual lives are like drops of water in a waterfall, separated from the world consciousness by momentum, rocks, wind, etc., and that death is the end of the waterfall, where we all rejoin the stream. Our consciousness would become endless. I rather like that theory.

Although I'm curious as to what would happen after death, it seems as though there's no point worrying about it. Yes, I'm scared of what may happen, but I guess that just something we'll have to deal with. Reincarnation seems useless, since you don't remember your past life, so you're basically an entirely different person living in a different environment to shape a whole new person. If all there is after death is... death, then so be it. The thought sucks, though, but that's why when you're given life, you should make the most of it, considering you have no real idea what happens after death. As for the Heaven and Hell thing... eh... if that's your belief, then believe in it. sweatdrop

Huh

I say we wait and see.