 The essential finitude of the individual is experienced at the very heart of life itself. “Life is anguish”, he remarked, “and enthusiasm and delight and bitterness and innumerable things”. According to Ortega, at a certain point during his or her experience, the individual may plunge into the mood of anxiety—as if he or she were “between the sword and the wall”—when death becomes imminent. “Death”, he continued, “is certain, there is no escaping it! Could there be less choice?” (Obras, VIII: 297; VII: 104). Ortega perceived the reality and the fact of death as essential in revealing the very essence and contingency of the individual’s being, which resembles similar views expressed by Heidegger. For, in the face of “possible death”, to experience life as being also implies an awareness of the possibility of life as not being. The acceptance of death, therefore, as a possible here-and-now discloses the radical—basic—finitude of human life.