Why don't people live forever?

Answer:

by: Venerable Nicolas Thanissaro

In terms of Buddhist cosmology, we find it no surprise that people don't live for ever - because even gods and angels don't live for ever. The reason for this is that people (and all the other sorts of beings caught up in the cycle of rebirth) have imperfection built into their physical makeup. We may live for longer or shorter periods of time depending on the purity of the environment in the era when we are born, but we don't live for ever. Part of the suffering in our human condition is that our body ages and deteriorates from the moment we are born - in visible (e.g. greying hair and wrinkles) or invisible (e.g. brain cell degeneration) ways. This is why we cannot rely on our physical body as our refuge, but need to strive for higher spiritual values that transcend this 'mortal coil'.