impermanence
Nothing lasts forever
Impermanence is the quality of not lasting forever.
The word appears most often in Buddhist philosophy, where recognizing that all things are impermanent—relationships, feelings, life itself—is considered essential to wisdom.
Outside religious contexts, impermanence usually carries a note of melancholy: the impermanence of youth, the impermanence of fame.
Lasting very briefly
- transitoryBrief in duration
- fleetingPassing very quickly
- momentaryLasting very briefly
- evanescentTending to vanish quickly
short-lived · temporary · fugacious · passing · brief · transient · fleetingness · ephemerality
Thorough change in form
- fluxContinuous change or flow
- metamorphosisProfound biological restructuring
- transitionChange from one state
- evolutionSpecies changing over generations
mutability · shift · alteration · variability · adaptation · modification · cycles · seasons
Gradual loss of intensity
- witheringDrying and declining
- decliningDecreasing in strength
- erodingGradually wearing away
- dissolvingPassing into solution
crumbling · deteriorating · decaying · disintegrating · vanishing · disappearing · diminishing · dwindling
Cessation of life
- finiteHaving definite bounds
- mortalSubject to death
- demiseCessation of existence
- expirationEnd of validity
lifespan · aging · afterlife · memorial · bereavement · funeral · cremation · ashes
Aesthetic valuing transience, incompleteness
- samsaraCycle of rebirth
- mayaPhenomenal world's deceptive nature
- emptinessAbsence of substance
- attachmentConnection or fondness
non-attachment · mindfulness · acceptance · presence · Buddhism · Heraclitus · meditation
ephemeral
Lasting very briefly
- transitoryBrief in duration
- fleetingPassing very quickly
- momentaryLasting very briefly
evanescent · short-lived · temporary · fugacious · passing · brief · transient · fleetingness · ephemerality · evanescence
transformation
Thorough change in form
- fluxContinuous change or flow
- metamorphosisProfound biological restructuring
- transitionChange from one state
evolution · mutability · shift · alteration · variability · adaptation · modification · cycles · seasons · renewal
fading
Gradual loss of intensity
dissolving · crumbling · deteriorating · decaying · disintegrating · vanishing · disappearing · diminishing · dwindling · waning
death
Cessation of life
expiration · lifespan · aging · afterlife · memorial · bereavement · funeral · cremation · ashes · dust
wabi-sabi
Aesthetic valuing transience, incompleteness
attachment · non-attachment · mindfulness · acceptance · presence · Buddhism · Heraclitus · meditation
- Buddhist teachingssutta, sutra, discourse, teachings, teaching
- timesecond, minute, hour, day, seconds
- changechange, flux, transformation, metamorphosis, alteration
- changeabilityvariability, mutability, fickleness, inconstancy, instability
- Deteriorationdecay, rot, degradation, deterioration, corrosion
- instabilityinstability, unsteadiness, shakiness, wobbliness, precariousness
impermanencepermanence
Quality of lasting indefinitely
eternity · permanency · everlastingness · perpetuity · endlessness
impermanencepermanence
Quality of lasting indefinitely
fixedness · immutability · constancy · unchangingness · changelessness