BULL SESSION: The circle of death

MANILA, Philippines - We shiver by just the thought of it. It was probably the reason why the word “surreal” was invented. And when it happens to the most important people in our lives, we realize that life can be absurd (and we start to agree with such familiar names from our philosophical books as Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus). Apart from that longing, that grief, there's the paranoia that's eating up our thoughts and emotions. We can't stop thinking about it before we sleep at night, “What happens after all of this?” I was almost an adult when a woman named Norma—my loved mom, the most influential person in my life—departed life on earth and it was the event that changed my life forever. I knew that life was more than material existence. Now, she—her loving comfort, her strength—breathes in the grand memory, the world of ideas that we call heaven. Yes, we do have certain beliefs and notions on life after death. Some of us think of heaven, purgatory and hell; some say reincarnation; others say nirvana. But death is just more than bodies decaying. It's about living in the moment, building memories and holding on to that belief. 

Photographer and musician Wawi Navarroza has a deep belief of memory and moment. And in her currently curated show, “Blind Field: Photography and Space,” the artist magnifies “the place” which is often underrated in photography. She shares the belief of how we change in different settings—at home, outdoors, on sea, in foreign lands; and these are all remembered through thoughts and photography. Each photograph created by the artist shows moments of what here and now, what we experience and what exist. Blues and alternative singer Chase Shellee, on the other hand, thinks that this creative force is her heaven—that powerful rush that just consumes you. It was during this enlightening All Souls' Day bull session with two smashing artists when realized that life after death exists in different forms. And it makes us feel all the more better. 

YOUNG STAR: What do you think happens in life after death?  

May the force be with you: The creative energy uplifts rising musician Chase Shellee.

WAWI NAVARROZA: Someone close to me died, a pretty close friend. At that time, it banged the reality to my face. It just made the idea real. We all know of grandfathers dying, grandmas dying, but when it happens like that, it put me in a strange memento mori way, like “Oh my God! It can happen and that's the end of it. Somebody, my dear friend, just stopped...It was very strange. Somehow I end up thinking, “Oh maybe It's not true.” There was a period when she was still fighting for her life. I was thinking, “Okay, death can be conquered by faith by people who love her so much!” And then after a while, there's some part of yourself that says, “Okay, let go.” And I go into this cloudy, hazy “and if she's dead, so what am I? Check. You're alive.” So if I'm alive, it's just strange like that because we can only figure out the other side of going on with your life if someone just stopped and all of us are moving. 

Surreal. 

NAVARROZA: She's 32 and young forever. She's also a musician, singer, writer—Anabel Bosch. And now, she lives through the blogs because she wrote massively. She's got a very tumultuous, very traumatic life dealing with serious shit like agoraphobia and dealing with being broke down to the last penny. And people read her blog now. This is when the cliché comes that “When you create something, it outlasts you.” Her songs are still in my iPod, we still read her poems in poetry readings. When philosophy was already being discussed in college, I realized that it's so fascinating how we can create so much and do so much and yet, we don't have plugs attached to us. And where do we get it from? If we are energy, where's the power plant? Are we on Wi-Fi? 

SHELLEE: I believe there is a force that we are all connected to. And I think artists sometimes are a little bit more connected than others because we take the time to ponder that connection: what inspires us, what makes us try to do some things beyond ourselves, something that lasts past this short earth life that we have. And a part of me says that it's God and then another part of me says that it's not limited to God because God all of sudden makes such a religious connotation and I don't mean it in that way. But I do believe that there is some force out there not yet labeled by any kind of religion because when you put a religious connotation to anything, all of a sudden you're trying to deal with control. And that's the exact opposite of what happens to anyone who reaches out to that source. Nothing is trying to control you, but something's trying to actually pull you beyond yourself. 

Freedom. 

SHELLEE: I've had way too many experiences of friends of mine having dreams or being visited by friends or grandparents who died. All of them had said the same thing basically. One's Muslim, one's Christian, one's atheist. And they all said the same thing, “I'm okay. I'm in a better place.” And as soon as they hear those words or they receive that message or they have that vision or dream or whatever, there's the peace that comes. I do believe there's a place that we go to afterwards but I don't believe in the traditional heaven-and-hell that taught fire and brimstone. I don't believe that because I also don't believe in organized religion and I think it's oppressive. 

Has your belief changed? 

NAVARROZA: Right now, I'm more preoccupied about asking about here and now, existential stuff like: “What am I doing here?” 

Conversation session: What’s your notion of life after death?

SHELLEE: I think that's healthier. (laughs) 

NAVARROZA: I think we die several times before we finally sort of like turn up the right end. Little forms of dying. Like in the lifetime, how many times have we shed skin and changed opinions from this to that is I think also little forms of transformation, leaving some stuff behind to go on. Life is in the living. 

I think experiencing ecstasy takes away all the dark doubts about living. 

SHELLEE: I think when somebody goes, they've gone on and they're at peace and we're the ones left questioning but they've already gotten all the answers that we still are asking. They've already reached that point and they're kind of waiting for us to become a little bit more evolved so that we can understand what they've crossed over to understand. In my head, in my twisted way of thinking, that's where I come from because I just think that it's always another level up, kind of like a waking up, like you were talking about little deaths all throughout life. It's almost like little by little, our vision gets clearer. And then we have to see through those eyes for a while and then it becomes clearer. And little by little by little by little, call it death, call it evolution, call it enlightenment, I think it's all basically going from one step to the next step to the next step. And then, when we're ready, that's when we cross over. 

NAVARROZA: I think I would like to invest on thinking about collective memory. I think everybody has an experience of that. It's very deeply rooted. It boils down to being part of the big whole human race. Shocks! It feels like it's Avatar! (laughs) 

SHELLEE: Expect for the hair connecting... (laughs) 

I agree with Carl Jung's collective unconscious. 

NAVARROZA: How are we relating to all these people that we study in the past? What do I have to do with all these dead people? But, we just share the same line. And [the things and people] closer to us like family, traits and sometimes inclinations, I think it's already written, designed and it goes through that line. It's fascinating because it goes beyond culture, goes beyond race...Collective memory.

PHOTOS: