At the time of passing the concern of friends surrounds and protects the one who is suffering and is a tangible help. When we have been involved closely with another, there has been a network of thought and feeling, an exchange. After that person is gone, this exchange is cut off. Therefore it is as though a part of us dies with the one who has departed. The experience is particularly acute for those who have been schooled in the idea that death is the end or that there will never be another association on earth again.
Nature is infinitely kind, however.
The full realization of what has happened takes a while to penetrate into all levels of our being. The awareness comes gradually, often considerably later than the event. Certainly there shines through the deepest sorrow an unspeakable beauty when we even begin to feel the true nature of what is occurring, realizing that inwardly there is no separation and that the one who has gone on is totally at rest. Such enlightened wisdom as contained in these words would not have been given in a scripture that has guided the lives of untold millions through the centuries, unless it contained a philosophy that could be understood and applied. As human beings we have earned the right, because of our mental and spiritual potential, to handle the assignment, difficult as it still is, to become more and more universal and impersonal in outlook and understanding.