Last week, I took what felt like a bold step: I asked a group of teenagers to contemplate their mortality.
The occasion was a homeschool class for teens. The subject was the Epic of Gilgamesh, humanity’s oldest surviving written story. In this ancient Mesopotamian tale, the hero Gilgamesh, devastated by his friend’s death, embarks on a desperate quest for immortality. Spoiler alert: he fails.
The thought of exploring the concept of death with a group of teens made me nervous. Would I be treading on some unknown sensitivity? Would parents complain? But it’s an important subject and a central theme in the text. Additionally, I remembered how profoundly Dead Poets Society and its exploration of “carpe diem”—seize the day—had affected me and my teenaged peers. I was keen to have this discussion with my students.
They took well to the topic, and we had a thoughtful, fascinating conversation. I was struck by both the teens’ willingness to engage with the concept and by their insights. When asked what constitutes a life well-lived, these students unanimously agreed: loving and being loved. Some also wanted to make the world better, but there was no mention of wealth, status, or even adventure. For them, a good life was about human connection.
The students’ home education background may have influenced their perspectives. While many traditionally-schooled teenagers are often strengthening ties with their peers and loosening family bonds, homeschooled teens can remain closely connected with parents—who also serve as teachers—for longer. This family-centred environment may well shape their values, but I like to think they are not so different from their school peers. I prefer to believe that their views offer a window into their generation—debunking prejudices cast by older generations that Gen Z is disengaged from what matters to us as humans.
Their openness to discussing mortality—and their interest in the conversation—was revealing. They approached death not with fear but with philosophical curiosity, recognising it as the universal experience that binds humanity. Birth and death—the shared bookends of life.
Just as Gilgamesh faces his mortality and searches for meaning, I wanted to give the teens a practical exercise to reflect on their own lives. I did so by asking them to write their obituaries.
They took the process seriously and as I watched them write, I realised that I – and, indeed, all of us – would benefit from doing this too. At the end of the class, I introduced a framing device that seemed to resonate: death as the ultimate deadline.
Throughout life, we confront deadlines – for projects, payments, and personal goals. These time constraints teach us about priorities and productivity. But there is one deadline that supersedes all others, one we cannot, for now at least, escape: the end of our lives. I don’t see this framing as morbid. Quite the opposite – it is liberating.
Oliver Burkeman explores this idea in Four Thousand Weeks, urging us to accept the finitude of our lives rather than trying to optimise our time in pursuit of endless productivity. We divert our focus with endless pursuits and with scrolling, postponing what truly matters until some hypothetical future when we’ll have “enough” time, money, or status. Meanwhile, the ultimate deadline draws inexorably closer.
When we acknowledge our limited time, it becomes not a source of anxiety but a catalyst for authentic living.
And death is not our only motivator. If we are brave enough, we might also consider other realities that come with being human. Factors like ageing, fertility, and our general health can all influence our chances of living the lives we want. But just as staring death in the face is difficult, so too is living with a constant eye on what separates us from the machines.
Being human is wonderful but it can be hard, unfair, and frightening.
The ancient Mesopotamians understood this well. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, when the tavern owner Siduri hears of the hero’s quest for immortality, she offers wisdom that resonates across millennia:
Gilgamesh, why do you run so far, since the life that you seek
You shall not find? For the gods, in their creation of mortals,
Allotted Death to man, but Life they retained in their keeping.
Gilgamesh, fill your belly with food,
Each day and night be merry, and make every day a holiday,
Each day and night dance and rejoice; wear clean clothes,
Yes, let your head be washed clean, and bathe yourself in the water,
Cherish the little one holding your hand; hold your spouse close to you and be happy,
For this is what is given to mankind.
This is not a call to hedonism, but to being present in our lives. It asks us to inhabit our finite selves rather than chasing immortality or postponing joy.
Perhaps there is wisdom in occasionally asking ourselves: “If my obituary were written today, would it reflect the life I want to have lived?”
If not, the ultimate deadline provides both urgency and clarity: carpe diem.
This class, Ancient Wisdom Texts, follows from the two series I ran last year on philosophy for home educated teens.