How do I accept mortality without becoming nihilistic or depressed about it?

Rabia al-Adawiyya didn't deny death—she leaned into it. She understood that knowing we'll die doesn't make life meaningless; it makes it *urgent* in the best way. The shift happens when you stop treating mortality as an enemy to defeat and start treating it as a teacher. Here's what actually helps: Notice what you do *anyway*, even knowing it ends. You love people. You make something. You show up. That persistence in the face of impermanence—that's not nihilism, that's devotion. Rabia called it pure love, love without transaction. You're not loving because you'll get something back. You're not building because it will last forever. You're doing these things because they matter *now*. The depression often lifts when you stop trying to outrun the fact of death and instead ask: what deserves my attention *because* time is finite? Not everything. The meaningful things become clearer. Community deepens when people know they won't have each other forever. Legacy shifts from monument-building to the quiet gift of having shown up, having loved, having noticed. Start small: name one person or practice that matters to you *especially* because it's temporary. That's the beginning of the shift—not from sadness to denial, but from paralysis to presence.