i am hard pressed to believe that anything different happens to us, than happens to a chipmunk hit by a car, or a tree that gets chopped down, or a goat that dies of old age, or a flower that does not get enough water.

the cells that make up that organism cease to carry on their life functions, and for all instents and purposes, the organism ends it's "life". the curtains close, the lights go dark, and the energy which your body had been running on gets dispersed around you and becomes part of something new. your body, in tern, decomposes in the ground, and returns to it's elemental foundations - aka, you break down.

as far as a mind or soul living on, i really just believe that when it's over, it's over. we are no more important or much different than that plant that got chopped. our consciousness is a mere byproduct of our intelligence. we are self-aware only because our brains allow us to be self-aware, and we assign an importance to ourselves because of that self-awareness.

unless that flower in your backyard is going to heaven when it dies, i think you have my answer.