For as long as I could remember, I’ve had a fear of dying. More precisely, of being dead. Apparently, psychotherapists call this “thanatophobia”.
The fear felt like there was a terrifying monster lurking in my subconscious. It would sprint towards me, desperate to grab hold if I should so much as glimpse at it for a moment. I would keep it locked up in the back of my mind, and there it stayed.
Decades passed. I was doing pretty well in life. On the surface at least. I had an amazing partner, completed a degree in art and design and was given my first art book publishing deal at 21 years old.
However, I was aware that I’d eventually need to confront this monster before it teared me apart from the inside. Unknown to the outside world, I’d been suffering from anxiety and depressive episodes throughout both my childhood and adult years due to this whole death issue. It was secretly ruining my life. Something needed to be done. It was on my 25th birthday that I decided to finally beat this fear at all costs!
Although I had no idea how to get over it. How do I rid myself of a fear that has always been a part of me?
As to not burden others, I’ve always been one to hide my emotions and try not to show weakness. However, I decided to bravely swallow my pride and ended up seeing a therapist. She believed I’d be able to tackle this monster over time. I was hopeful. Several sessions later and things weren’t working out. She’d often veer off topic; Bringing up her own issues such as her alcoholic father or husband who seemingly also had a problem with drink. Half the time I felt like I was her therapist! I left.
At around the same time life decided to punish me; A relationship with my partner ended, my best friend betrayed me and the art in my gallery, at the time, was not selling and causing extra stress I didn’t need. I felt so defeated. I thought, now I might as well just unlock the monster in my mind and embrace my phobia head on. How much worse can things get? They did get worse! The fear gripped me to such an extent that and I had a complete metal breakdown…
I was used to dealing with problems. For example, even the process of learning to draw presented me challenges and failures to overcome on a daily basis. Fortunately, that meant I’d managed to build up some resilience and inner strength I could use to help get me through what felt like hell. It took months, but I finally made my way through the abyss and back out the other side. My life circumstances eventually began to improve.
Still determined to alleviate my fears of death, I tried a new, more measured approach. Over the course of several years in my 20s and 30s I read many books on religion, spirituality, psychology and even theoretical physics. It was an invaluable education, giving me an exciting new perspective on life, death and the universe.
As a part of my journey to understand death, I learned of Mexico’s ‘Day of the dead’. Rather than being a morbid depressing funeral, it’s a festive celebration held to honour the dead. It demonstrates a refreshing mix of joy, colours and sounds with what is usually considered solemn, spooky and sad. It illustrates the view that life and death are complicated topics. That death is a nuanced topic and not the end of everything. In fact, it can be the start of a celebration!
As of now, I’m happy and doing great! My personal life has sorted itself out and have people around me I love and care about. Professionally, I can’t complain- having sold thousands of individual artworks to customers across the globe, and with my art books selling over a million copies and translated into several languages. Most importantly, I’ve finally started coming to terms with my mortality.
We cannot know ultimate truth or what lies beyond. And so, I learned defining death as this scary, bad thing is not necessarily correct and certainly not useful. I created this artwork to remind us that there can be something positive, even beautiful about death. And perhaps death is simply a transition? I created this artwork to remind us to live our best life, knowing that each day could be our last. Now when asked "why do we have to die?" I respond, "to make life worth living".