Living Awareness of Death

The Prophet Muhammad is reported to have said: “Remember death much because it demolishes all desires.” (Sunan Ibn Majah 4258)

If people have a living awareness of death, their worldly attachments will disappear. They will consider the life after death to be more important than the life before death. Their thinking will become completely Hereafter-oriented. As a result, their hopes and aspirations, their activities, engagements and plans—all these would also become oriented to the Hereafter.

A person who is heedless of death begins to think of this world as everything. The profit and loss of this world overwhelms his mind. He becomes a worshipper of this world.

Death is such a reality that if someone gains a living awareness of it, a total revolution takes place in his life. He will be constantly aware of that day when everyone, including himself, will have to stand before the Lord of the worlds. His greatest concern will be how to save himself from the admonishment of God in the Hereafter. He will fear Hell the most and will desire Paradise the most. Awareness of the reality of the Hereafter will be clearly evident in every aspect of his life.