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been doing down the ages: "Have strong egos." The whole of education is based in giving you a strong ego.
And the problem is that the more strong an ego you have the more you are disconnected with existence, because the more you feel you are separate, the more you ARE separate. And to remain separate from existence creates fear, creates paranoia.
Why are people so afraid of death? Do you think they are really afraid of death? You may not have meditated over it. Nobody is afraid of death -- because how can you be afraid of something which you have not seen yet? You cannot be afraid of something which is unknown, you can only be afraid of something which is known. A child is not afraid of catching hold of a snake, a child is not afraid of putting his hand into the fire. Why is he not afraid?because he does not know! How can he be afraid of the snake? He has no past experience, no bitter experience. How can he be afraid of the flame? -- he has never been burned before. How can you be afraid of death? You don't know anything about death. Who knows? It may be a beautiful rest. Who knows? It may take you to a higher plane of life. Who knows? It may give you freedom from your body. Who knows? How can you be afraid of death? No, nobody is afraid of death; let me say it clearly.
But you will say everybody IS afraid of death, I know. There is something else in it: people are NOT afraid of death, they are afraid of losing their separation, they are afraid of losing their ego. Once you start feeling separate from existence the fear of death arises because then death seems to be dangerous. You will no longer be separate; what will happen to your ego, your personality? And you have cultivated the personality with such care, with such great effort; you have polished it your whole life, and death will come and destroy it.
If you understand, if you see, if you can feel and experience that you are not separate from existence, that you are one with it, all fear of death disappears because there is nobody to die inside you. In the first place there is nobody at all, existence lives through you.
Saint Paul says, "Not I, but Christ lives through me."
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