“You cannot control your mind at the last minute of your death.”

The Teaching of Ajahn Suchart.

29 November 2023

“You cannot control your mind at the last minute of your death.”

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Question: How should we prepare someone who is going to die within his last breath? What is the correct mental state to be when we’re in our last minute or seconds to our death?

Than Ajahn: You cannot control your mind at the last minute of your death. It is because the kamma that you’ve done during your life time will be the ones that take over your mind at the last moment of your life. So, what you should do when you are still alive is trying to create a lot of good kamma and avoid doing bad kamma. Then, the sum total of the kamma will be on the positive side, on the good side. This good and positive kamma will calm the mind. It will send the mind to a good state of existence.

If you are a meditator, you can use mindfulness to calm your mind. When you are sick, when you know that you’re going to die soon, you use mindfulness to calm your mind by reciting a mantra or by watching your breath.

If you are on the level of Dhamma or vipassanā, you can contemplate the impermanent nature of the body. 

You let go of the body. Don’t cling to the body. Let the body die. You are the mind. You don’t die with the body. Your mind will feel bad if you cling to the body because your mind doesn’t want your body to die.

If you want your mind to be peaceful and calm, then you will have to look at the body as impermanent. Look at it as the 4 elements. The body is not yourself. You are not the body. You are the mind. You have to separate the mind from the body by letting the body be. 

If the body is going to stop breathing, let it stop breathing. If the body is going to be in pain, let it be in pain. Don’t try to do anything to the body. If the doctor can fix the body with some medication, fix it. But if the doctor cannot fix it, you’ll just have to let it happen. Let it be. Then, your mind will be peaceful and calm.

Youtube: “Dhamma in English, Nov 9, 2018.”

By Ajahn Suchart Abhijāto
www.phrasuchart.com

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