We cannot hope to die peacefully if our lives have been full of violence, or if our minds have mostly been agitated by emotions like anger, attachment, or fear. So if we wish to die well, we must learn how to live well: Hoping for a peaceful death, we must cultivate peace in our mind, and in our way of life.
The creatures that inhabit this earth-be they human beings or animals-are here to contribute, each in its own particular way, to the beauty and prosperity of the world.
When we have inner peace, we can be at peace with those around us. When our community is in a state of peace, it can share that peace with neighboring communities.
We know that to wage a nuclear war today, for example, would be a form of suicide; or that to pollute the air or the oceans in order to achieve some short-term benefit would be to destroy the very basis for our survival.
As free human beings we can use our unique intelligence to try to understand ourselves and our world. But if we are prevented from using our creative potential, we are deprived of one of the basic characteristics of a human being.