Short story: The Zen master became depressed about his coming death

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The great Zen master, Artruf Herploxke, was coming towards the end of his long life. Strangely enough, the idea of his coming death, depressed him. He had never been depressed in his life before. He realised that he was not yet empty enough of life to accept death into his emptiness. Emptiness exists, unemptied of itself, until we try to empty it from our self, then it fills up with our self, and we then try to eliminate ourselves from emptiness. A recipe for disaster indeed! We must accept emptiness into our self to be full of life, and not full of thoughts of death, that only serve to depress us with themselves. Depression is a false form of emptiness. As a result of his realisation, the old Zen master wrote this short poem: Poetry: Depression emptied of itself Depression sits alone, until you sit with it. Only then does it affect you from itself, because you empty yourself into it. Wake up to love, and let all else go. Happy with this effort, he smiled immensely in his happiness. All his depression was gone. Then he died, happy, not depressed. Emptiness is more important than what tries to fill it. Photo Credit: The photo used in this article was sourced from the free media site, pixabay.com We should not try to lose our self in death, but stay alive to its presence.