Be still my beating heart

Published on March 31, 2011 by The Editor · No Comments

Lucy Hartley recalls when she realised she’s not going to be around forever – and how she finally came to terms with her mortality, the transience of her being

I became aware of my transience quite early on, in my first year of primary school, whilst watching an educational film on the human body.

To illustrate the role played by blood, pulse and veins in keeping us upright an animated heart pulsated on screen with explanatory dialogue to the effect of ‘when your heart stops beating your blood will no longer move, resulting in…death.’ Then the animated heart lay motionless.

This film was probably supposed to encourage us to eat fruit and run around – I can’t say it’s had a huge impact on my lifestyle habits, however it did send me running to my mother’s bed on many a night.

The image of the non-beating heart absolutely confirmed to me my transience, that I would one day cease to exist. I fought it. There’s a lot of 5 cent pieces lying in wishing wells that represent my childhood bid for immortality.

My mum gave me some golden paper on which to write the things that I really wanted, and we took these bits to a Buddhist temple and burnt them; to my youthful understanding, it was a magical ritual in which I could score anything I wanted!

I asked to be a fairy and to never die.

A couple of years passed by and my fear of death had strangely enough morphed into horror at the notion of an eternal afterlife. Because the idea of time never ever ending scared and bewildered me, in the same way that wondering where outer space ended put a jolt in my belly.

The creeping feeling would pop up at moments when my imagination was running amok, actually most typically when I was supposed to be cleaning my room so I think it blossomed into a morbid, pre-internet form of escapism.

Retrospectively I feel that maybe it was a blessing that the frigging video forced me to confront death at such a young and impressionable age, rather than having awareness creep up on me in later life.

It might even have influenced the decisions I have made throughout my (still fairly short) lifetime. Now that I’ve hit adulthood my neurosis tends not to dwell on my transience, to fixate on more earthly themes like my income and the warts that keep appearing at random on my right hand (why? WHY???) – and I find dwelling on my impermanence quite comforting.

Are you dying to find out what if anything happens beyond this life? Or are you happy living for each day as it comes? Discuss

Lucy Hartley is enjoying her life as a wowdewow blogger