1,222 Quotes About Dying

Consumption can be a remedy against boredom and may convey a sense of fictitious power and supremacy, by standing out from the crowd through the extravagance of the expenditure. As it becomes an addiction, however, it might be cured, if the right medication is administered : humbleness and mindful discovery of the others. (“Buying now, dying later”)

Modern society drinks in streams of information while dying of wisdom thirst.

Watching a parent die is a terrible task. My father, faced with something he could not talk down or browbeat into submission, spent his days with the bottle, as if he determined to drink himself to death, as if his alcohol could hold back the disease that swept through his brain.

Sometimes I wonder if other people think about death - frequently, or just in general. I wonder if they think about it casually, like they’re thinking of the weather, or if they think of it lying awake at night, haunted by their own thoughts. I wonder… if they do think about it, do they ever think about their own death - the when, the how?

Kiran was dying, but he could no longer tell whether it was from the blood staining the stone red; he could no longer tell whether this death had been pulled from his body long before the knife had ever met his skin. The anger had taken that knowledge from him, had blurred the lines between gold and red. His mouth tasted of blood and ash.

blue-gold sky, fresh cloud, emerald-black mountain, trees on rocky ledges, on the summit, the tiny pin of a telephone tower-all brilliantly clear, in shadow and out. and on and through everything everywhere the sun shines without reservation (p. 97)

...gripping the rim of the sink you claw your way to stand and cling there, quaking with will, on heron legs, and still the hot muck pours out of you. (p. 27)

We know: An almost certain way to die is to believe you are already dead.

The only way past the pain is through it. Pain, grief, anger, misery...they don't go away--they just increase and compound and get worse. You have to live through them, acknowledge them. You have to give your pain its due.