225 - The Audacity to Live

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About this episode

In this episode, I explore what death has to teach us about being fully alive, prompted by the recent death of mountaineer Nirmal "Nims" Purja in an avalanche in Pakistan. Starting with Richard Dawkins' reminder that "we are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones," I reflect on why there is nothing ordinary about an ordinary life — and why so many of us still leave the winning lottery ticket of being alive sitting in a drawer. I share the Buddha's teaching on mindfulness of death, where only the monks practicing at the timescale of a single mouthful or a single breath are called truly awake, along with the five remembrances, the Pali words samvega (the jolt when mortality gets real)…