Living Forever

In less than a week I turn 36. Not old by any stretch of the imagination but old enough to start thinking about where my life is going, what I have achieved and what is next.

When I say what is next, I mean is there anything after this life, or is this all that there is? Before this year if someone had offered me endless life then I would have taken it, but now I have second thoughts.

Conceptualising

If I were to live alone forever (my current loved ones are not with me in this scenario) then whilst I would make new friends, for me, love is forever. Living without my wife for eternity therefore sounds like a bad idea. I don't want to live without her.

In addition to this, the need to be hidden would become more and more paramount as endless life is something many would want to take. You could therefore very easily imagine experimentation, something that opens the door to another thread and that is health.

I love my life and the only fear I have at the moment is my health. Will I be healthy enough to do everything that I want to in my retirement? If not then will I end up with regret and imagine having a failing health state for the lifespan of the universe!

On top of this, even if you had your health and all of your friends and family then would you want to work forever? Your money would not be infinite and even if the investments you made were well-placed and set you up for life, they would be visible and trigger experimentation.

Heaven

The concept of an afterlife was drilled into me at a young age. I was raised at Sunday School but as I grew older, the church offered me more questions than answers questions and so I left.

• Heaven as a concept, would it not get boring?
• What if you were married, died young and then your partner spent more time with their new partner, would you be able to live harmoniously?
• If you have Alzheimer's or die young, then will you be brought through to heaven with the same body and mind, or would you reset to the ideal state?
• Is every single human from history contained in the same heaven, or are only Christians?
• What would you do for eternity?

The concept of heaven or an afterlife I can only picture as a human and the need for new experience. I am well aware that the concept of something no one has been through is flawed but I have nothing else.

Nothing

Is the more likely option that there is nothing? After this life, we are simply like a battery that is thrown out, left to decompose in the ground.

I hope not but also say so against my earlier points of needing to be healthy, in the correct mental state and also have the funds, people and anonymity to live forever. Not sure what eternal boredom would look like?

All of this is what I have been thinking about for the past month. It is something that I now consider every year in the run-up to my birthday as I like to be in control and sort of want to know.

My heart tells me that it will be like falling asleep (on a scale of pain to painless) but who knows? To consider this being it and nothing else feels rather empty and it would be good to consider that there was a reason.

A Final Thought

36 I do not believe is old. I hope that it is merely the last year on the second part of my life (each generation being 18 years long and I have five of these available to me). I then have another 54 years left to play with (more time in front than behind).

My worry with this way of thinking is that I have no real evidence to back it up. I do not know not what will happen when I die and if I do not make it to 50 for example, then will my wife move on and forget me in the afterlife?

I have many questions and the comforting and worrying thing to takeaway here is that I may never discover what the 'correct' answer is? It could be that those who go to church get into heaven and those who do not believe receive silence in death.