10 Answers

  1. It should be understood that the emphasis on the issues of dying, not death, and memorial rites is a recent, post-war history. It is connected with the development of medicine and the dictates of medical language: these controlled deaths, deaths from the point of view of managerial approaches-we know how we can die, we protect ourselves and our relatives with the help of medicine.

    And of course, this medical language strongly affected the modern perception of death.

    Many of the people who have ever encountered attempts to learn what dying is and how it is perceived are familiar with the name Kubler-Ross, who was an employee of the nascent palliative medicine in the United States and wrote a book about the “good death”, about the five-phase model of accepting death: the terminally ill person goes through anger, denial, acceptance, and so on. Modern experts in the field of dying harshly criticize Kubler-Ross and her idea of dying, which gave birth to such a concept as”a good death”. This is a very ideologically loaded construction, from the point of view of medicine, from the point of view of the psychoanalytic approach, and so on. And a modern person, getting into a hospice somewhere in America, is faced with what the nurses will tell him: “So, you're angry right now. And now denial.” Palliative care is quite a tough thing.

    “A good death — is a different concept for each denomination and social group. We understand that for traditional Christian culture, for example, death must be accompanied by suffering. James Green, in his book Beyond the good death, writes that the modern black religious population of America prefers death with suffering. They turn to palliative medicine less often, not because they are biased or don't have access to it, but because they believe that a true Christian should suffer before dying. A person must suffer before death.

    A person should die with dignity, surrounded by loved ones, and in comfort. But at the same time, we must understand that there is also a problem that comes out of medicalization, that not every death can be available: the ethical problems of euthanasia, suicide.

    When we talk about a good death, we must separate ideologically normative constructs and various influences, and understand that a good death is different for each time and religious group.

  2. My answer is radically different from the answers above.

    To die, so to die beautifully . Falling off a cliff or maybe from a helicopter.To die because of an unopened parachute in a jump of 4000 meters.Why not? On the move, with emotions flooding through you, just not sitting and thinking about your time alone in a quiet place, at least not for me.

    Of course, the consequences will not be entirely pleasant,but it will no longer matter.

    In general, it is better not to think about it:]

  3. I don't seem to know, but I do know that it is necessary not to tremble and be afraid, but, oddly enough, with a sense of self-esteem. Probably, there is no need to be afraid, because all previous humanity has passed along this path. So the road is known. And support yourself with it.

  4. Well, it depends on what your goals are.

    Making your relatives feel good is one thing, making yourself feel good is another, and living longer is a third.

    It's still a good idea to understand what “death” is.

    It used to be simple: you fell, you don't breathe – well, OK, you died, so it happens, let's go bury it.

    Then we learned how to pump it out. There was a thesis that death is “brain death”. But here, too, it is not easy, ways to reanimate the brain do not stand still, and now there are already experimental methods to reanimate what is still considered dead from the point of view of the law.

    Further more. The brain, cells and membranes don't seem to be you, you would have been able to do it somehow without them, well, at least there could have been some kind of operation where they would have replaced your brain with a computer. So you can come to the conclusion that death is the loss of information about your consciousness, i.e. the inability to restore you. When does such a death occur? It is difficult to estimate, but by that time in any decent country you will definitely have time to bury in the ground. Excluding your temporary memory, the loss of which you will survive, you are physically defined by synaptic connections in your brain, which are made up of matter, and even if this substance starts to “deteriorate” somehow, it will still be “in place”for a long time.

    Thus, final death does not occur very quickly, and in general, death is a long process, and not just a short moment.

    And here you are asking how to die properly?

    Various options are possible, including trying not to die at all.

  5. For a Christian, the main threat is sudden death, for which a person does not have time to prepare. Vasily Vasilyevich Rozanov, having received the news that his nephew was killed in a car accident, said: “What a terrible death! This is how animals die: without suffering, without being sick of their sins.” A person must become a co-author of their own death. That is, being conscious, understanding what is happening. That he was going on the greatest journey of his life. There is such a Komsomol song: two Komsomol members say goodbye and wish with all their hearts “if death is instantaneous, if the wound is small.”�

    So nothing more anti-Christian can be desired. The ideal death is like this: I lie at home in my bedroom and see that death has appeared on the next hill. She goes up to my floor, knocks on my door, and I tell her: “Come in. Wait a minute. Sit down on the path. Well, I'm ready – let's go.” If death meets eye to eye, a person does not regret the past, but looks to the future, it will not be death, but dormition. And the word “assumption” clearly reads both “ripeness” and”success”. According to Marina Tsvetaeva: “My God, the soul has come true. Your intent is the most secret.” This is a Christian death, when he has prepared himself, when he has had time to say goodbye to his neighbors. Here are the last hours of Pushkin's life – this is a very good description of Christian care.

    https://www.youtube.com/embed/X4IuJMnONT4?wmode=opaque

  6. What does it mean to die properly? You live, and then you die or die (suddenly or not). That's it. There are no prescriptions for death and its methods.

    For the first time I can't keep up with 140.

  7. It is better to die in a dream, or abruptly, so as not to suffer yourself and not to torment your loved ones, so as not to have time to be afraid. And even better, it is to reach a state of consciousness in which you can safely make this transition.

  8. I would like to be able to release my bladder and intestines on my own beforehand.)

    For some reason, the thought of a sudden relaxation of the sphincters after death is creepy to me. Ever since I found out about it, I've been haunted by this thought. I guess that's also why I'm afraid to die.

  9. At first, I thought that at the moment of death, a person will not care how to die, because the rest (rituals, etc.) will be on the conscience of the participants in the process.

    And then it suddenly occurred to me that it would be more correct to save the environment from such troubles and leave instructions in advance on how and what to do, so that they would not be tormented in heavy thoughts and were calm, and the will should also be left so that the relatives would not fight over the inheritance…

  10. When such a question is asked, I can't help but think of Galsworthy's little interlude, “The Last Summer of Forsyth,” about old Jolyon's death. This is perhaps one of the few death stories without the existential horror of the Great Unknown Something. An old man who has not lost the ability to feel and think, who has known peace and is filled with peace, quietly dies in his sleep next to his faithful dog at sunset on a summer day, waiting for a beautiful woman who promised to visit him. Amazing poetry and subtle lyricism.

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