Dissolving the Self
Last week, I had elective surgery done. The first surgery of any kind for me in 55 years, since I was a child. Although I didn’t have any life-threatening condition, the procedure required being put under by general anesthesia. And I found myself utterly terrified at the prospect of never waking up – which is a relatively rare result of anesthesia, but it does happen. I was terrified of my life ending abruptly, and all the things undone and the goodbyes unsaid.
Fear of death is something I’ve been dealing with for most of my life, as many of us have. As with all fear, what’s essential is to embrace the fear of death, to lean into it, to see what there might be to learn from it, rather than reject or avoid it. I took this to heart as the time grew closer to when I would receive the anesthesia, I felt my life up to that point take on a deeper glow, like how the color of the landscape changes as sunset approaches. Huge gratitude for all my years on Earth. And I felt my present life slowing down and more deeply inhabiting each moment that arrived, being IN the moment, rather than focused on its passing. And, with the encouragement of the Zen Buddhist chaplain that was with me, I visualized my Self, my basic Gary-hood, dissolving ever so gently, sort of like falling asleep at night. Not ending, but dissolving into something bigger, far bigger than the fear of what might be coming. In a sense, nothing was coming, only that I was expanding into the future, into whatever was there. All very subtle, but quite real. There was nothing to resist. It all felt okay, very okay, very peaceful. The anesthesia entered me, all thinking stopped…and the next thing I knew it was three hours later and the surgery was done. And here I am…Alive and lighter.