08/19/2025
Daoist Immortality
Rethinking a Beautiful Way of Life
(Part One)
Across time, cultures, and cosmologies, most Spiritual traditions have an expression or aspiration of Immortality.
Some people, throughout history, have imagined immortality as a kind of enlightenment, others a source of longevity and prolonged youth, and some people see it as a way to hold dominion over the world forever.
Some people choose to meditate every day, others eat organic and take vitamins everyday, and some learn old ways to try and make a deal with powerful forces – either purifying their Soul or selling it for power.
What Does Immortality Really Mean?
I like to take words apart so I can put them back together again. I want to ensure we can both agree on what is meant.
The words Impermanent, impossible or immortal all start with the prefix ‘im’. This prefix can mean ‘not’, or ‘not likely’, or ‘not usually.’
The prefix ‘im’ can also mean ‘to go deeper into’. For example, important comes from ‘to portend,’ which means to watch for something, something meaningful, something consequential. In this way, important means to go deeper into this portend, this something, this potential consequence.
Another example is impermanence. Which can mean ‘not permanent for too long,’ or ‘not permanent at all,’ or it can ask us to go deeper into the existential angst of permanence, or the pain attached to holding on to things that are beyond anyone’s control.
Immortality can mean you are not going to physically die of natural causes. It can mean that you cannot be killed. Or it may suggest going deeper into the meaning of death and the imminent truth of each of our dying.
Mortality, after all, is a journey each of us must eventually go on – on the inside – alone…
Honoring Mortality
Life expectancy 200 years ago was around 40. That number gets misused, so lets clarify something. Many people 200 years lived into their 60’s. It was just that less that half of children lived past 8 and 70% didn’t make it to 20. It messes with the math.
Life expectancy, if you are under 40 years of age today, is about 80 years.
Statistics are not always right, but if you choose to honor your health and the probability that medical science can continue to reduce all cause mortality, 80 is becoming probable. And that is for people with just above average habits.
Human lifespan has always been the same. As close to 120 as you can get.
How long could you live if you committed to a path of longevity on every level?
What could be possible if you had long lived genes and science learns how to make life even longer?
Historically and mythically, who has Lived the Longest?
– In the Western world, there is documented proof that Jeanne Clement (from France) lived 122.5 years.
– There is a Daoist story with some evidence that Luo Meizhen lived to be 127, and a modern myth about a recluse named Li Ching Yuen who, it is said, lived to a vibrant 246 years of age.
– The Bible implies Methuselah lived for 969 years.
Fact of fiction, how long would you really want to live – if you could?
Reed the rest on Substack
[https://drmichaelsmith.substack.com/.../daoist...](https://drmichaelsmith.substack.com/.../daoist...)!
