Question: How can we overcome the fear of death?

Sri Chinmoy: In the outer world when somebody dies, you observe that his life-energy has departed. You see him and you are frightened. But if you enter into the inner world and observe people who are not aspiring, you will see that they are already dead. There are millions of individuals on earth who are not praying and meditating, and who have no aspiration to do anything worthwhile on earth. Their spiritual energy has already expired, and in God's Eye, they are all dead.

Right now you are afraid of death because you think of yourself as your body, your mind, your senses. But a day will come when, on the strength of your aspiration, prayer and meditation, you will think of yourself not as the body but as the soul. You will think of yourself as a conscious instrument of God. Since God is omnipresent, and He is utilising you to manifest Himself, how can He ever abandon you to death?

Conquering the fear of death depends on how much love you have for God, and how sincerely you need Him. If you need someone, immediately you establish a kind of inner access to that person. If your need for God is soulful, devoted and constant, then in the inner world you establish a free access to God's Love, God's Compassion, God's Concern. And if you can always feel God's Love, Compassion and Concern, then how can you have the feeling of death? The moment you feel that you need God and He needs you, the moment you feel God inside you, before you and around you, then death no longer exists for you. When God is away from your mind, when God is not to be found inside your heart, when you feel that God is nowhere near you, at that time death exists for you. Otherwise, where is death? This physical body may leave the earth, but the soul, which is a conscious portion of God, will remain consciously in God and for God throughout Eternity.

It is up to you to think of yourself as the body or as the soul. If you think of yourself as the body, and do not aspire, then in the spiritual life you are already dead. But if you think of yourself as the soul, that means you have already developed an inner connection with God. If you know that the soul is your real Reality, you will not have any fear of death.