Mat

Void

Absense, or void, is the only thing that truly allows anything else to exist without any conditions. Anything else is exerting some force on the things around it. This is true at the physical, mental, and likely spiritual levels. So the only true mechanism for achieving freedom is to be completely separated. Freedom itself is on a spectrum and not always good when we aren't ready. Still, we should be thankful to void for the freedom it gives us even though it's often scary.

This also has some implications for some of the hard things that happen to us like losing loved ones. When people know it is their time to go, that is an understanding that their time for influence over others is at an end. It's very noble to be able to acknoledge when you are starting to consume more than you are producing. It is sad because we remember all the good they did, but we should also thank them for giving us the gift of absense when the time was right.

That's not to glorify death, but only to accept it as it is. Through technology we develop ways to extend our useful lives. If longevity research gets to a point where we have cured old age, we will each be able to contribute for a much longer time and have deeper understanding of the world around us. It will also lead to worse mental failure states though which we will need better technology to avoid. And death at that point will be when we choose to part from each other to go experience something new, which will be almost as hard.