There is nothing to be afraid of in death. There is nothing difficult about death. Death is nothing more than the consciousness leaving this body. That’s all. The connection with this body finishes, and the mindstream leaves the body and finds another one. It is not death itself that is frightening; it is the mind’s projections about death that make us frightened. It is our own mind that creates the fear, not death itself.
Death is the mind separating from the body under the control of karma and delusions. As long as the consciousness is associated with the body, there is life. The association of mind and body is life; the disassociation of mind from body is death.
In other words, what is called “death” is created by our mind. Death is merely a label that our mind creates to describe the process of the consciousness leaving the body. When that separation occurs, the mind imputes “death.” There is no real death that exists inherently, from its own side. It is merely a convenient label, ultimately unreal. Therefore, not only is there no such thing as a frightening death, there is also no such thing as death, in reality. The real death that we so fear — that real independent death — is merely labeled by the mind.
The concept of a fearful death has been created by the mind that clings to the “permanent” things of this world, things that it sees it will lose when death happens: our body, friends, possessions, and so forth. Because the mind is not able to let go of this life and the things of this life, death becomes terrifying. The unsubdued mind that is controlled by attachment to worldly pleasure creates this fear; it is not death itself that creates it. And yet, even though this imputed idea is nothing but a hallucination, we believe in this wrong concept of an independent frightening death. The great master Naropa said,
When we are born, the concept is born; when we are sick, the concept is sick; and even when we are dying, the concept is dying.
In other words, everything is a concept. When we logically analyze what death really is, we find that the way that it appears to us and the way we apprehend it to exist is false.
The great yogi Saraha said that without the concept, there are no external enemies; there are no vicious tigers, no poisonous snakes. If we have anger, we find external enemies; if we have no anger, we won’t be able to find external enemies. If we have the concept of an enemy, we see an enemy; if we have no concept of an enemy, we don’t see an enemy. If we have no anger and no concept of an enemy, we will be completely unable to find an enemy, even if everyone around us is angry with us, criticizes us, or even kills us.
Whether or not death is a problem depends on the mind. Death itself is not terrifying, but our concept of death can be terrifying. When we change our clothes, we leave our old clothes behind and put on new ones. Like that, the mind leaves this body and takes another one, all dependent on causes and conditions. The mind labels this phenomenon of mind separating from body as “death,” incorrectly seeing it as permanent and inherent.
A Healthy Fear of Death
Why, then, should we be afraid of death? Why can’t we be like the great meditators and be happy, knowing that whatever happens after death will only be wonderful? The reason is because we simply do not really know that things will be good after death, and if we are honest, we will accept that we have not reached the stage where we can safely face death without fear.
Along with an understanding of impermanence and death — knowing that we will definitely die and that the time of that death is uncertain — we also need to have an understanding of karma. In particular, we need to understand and accept that we have created a lot of very negative actions in the past that still sit on our mindstream as imprints, and that we are still incapable of creating only virtuous actions because of our past habituation.
Lama Tsongkhapa explained that unless we overcome our attachment to this life and attain the happiness of future lives, not only will liberation be impossible but we will be reborn in the lower realms in our next life. This shows us the kind of fear of death we need. The worldly person’s fear of death — the fear of separation from all the objects of desire — is due to attachment and is a great hindrance at death. The fear of being thrown into the lower suffering realms, however, is the best possible antidote for attachment. This fear is extremely useful to have now, while we have the time to do something about it.
Up to now, we have failed to recognize the cause of suffering. But now we can see that all of the problems in life come from nonvirtuous actions, and that nonvirtuous actions will continue to cause great suffering in our next life. If fear comes from this thought, that is good — it should. That is a positive fear. Before, we were ignorant of the source of our suffering, but now we know its source, and because of that, we can do something about it.
The fear of death is a powerful trigger that can rapidly turn our mind toward the Dharma and jumpstart our spiritual practice. It can bring a deep sense of nonattachment, peace, and satisfaction. When we encounter a fear such as this, we look to what will save us, which is principally refuge in the Three Rare Sublime Ones: the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. The fear of death, and of rebirth in the lower realms, leads to an attitude of renunciation toward worldly attachments to this life. This, in turn, leads to the renunciation of our attachment to the whole of samsara, which leads us to the path of the higher capable being, the development of compassion and bodhichitta, and the wish to attain enlightenment in order to benefit all sentient beings.
When there is no longer the possibility of experiencing a suffering rebirth, the fear of death will naturally drop away. Through the fear of death, knowing we are going to die, we become motivated to practice Dharma with such energy that we renounce the whole of samsara, and thus, we not only transcend the fear of death, we transcend death itself.
In The Great Nirvana Sutra, the Buddha says,
Among all the reapings, the autumn harvest is supreme.
Among all the tracks, the track of the elephant is supreme.
Among all the ideas, the idea of impermanence and death is supreme because with it you eliminate all the attachment, ignorance, and pride of the three realms.
Like the Buddha says here, the fear of death is founded on wisdom and not ignorance. It is a very healthy fear. We all need this fear. I wish I had more fear! But, as I have said, fear is only good when it comes from wisdom and not ignorance, so I would not be so happy about having ignorant fear. The fear of losing the things that we cling to — the “me” and “mine” — is the kind of fear that arises from ignorance. The wise fear that the Buddha describes above is completely different. Instead of allowing our delusions to make us afraid, we develop a healthy fear of our delusions, which encourages us to do whatever we can to overcome them. Seeing ourselves and the world as permanent, we trap ourselves in the prison of samsara; understanding impermanence and death, we liberate ourselves from that prison.
By reminding ourselves that we might die at any time, we will naturally be very careful in our actions and have great energy to practice virtuous actions and abandon nonvirtuous actions.
Adapted from How to Live and Die: The Transformative Power of Meditating on Impermanence by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, ©2025 Wisdom Publications
