Talking about death won't kill you!

I have heard people say as a positive conclusion to a list of physical ailments or complaints "Oh well, it beats the alternative!" To which people respond with agreement, acknowledging that whatever we may be experiencing, we are still alive and that is always preferable to being dead! After all death is the ultimate fear, the unknowable and the great void, the end...that's all she wrote!  Shakespeare's Hamlet contemplated "to be and not to be" concluding that there may not be peace even in the permanent sleep of death. How can we know so lets not go there, what's the point?

I was browsing a book at my library the other day, intriguingly entitled "Talking about death won't kill you," just my kind of book by the way. I like to tackle ideas that others throw up their eyes at and have little time for. The author Virginia Morris, a woman after my own heart as we would say in Ireland, was putting forward the idea that talking about death has many overlooked benefits. It can help us appreciate life more fully for one thing, it can help friends and families appreciate the relationships we enjoy more deeply and also can help immensely when the inevitability of loss visits our lives.

My father broached the subject of his demise to me years ago when he was making his will. I kept the discussion brief, adding I didn't want to imagine that day. This is a very natural response and I know I am not alone in my feelings. But I wish I'd been able to say how much I loved him and how unthinkable it was to no longer have him in my life. I wish we could have held each other and acknowledged that love and continued our discussion to its conclusion in awareness of the reality of that eventuality.

So many of us run from emotion - from being real and authentic and we miss out. I really feal our lives would be richer if we could simply allow our selves to be real. Emotion and discomfort just like all things come to pass and not to stay...we will not be swallowed in the slough of despond forever..in fact if we go there we can come out more quickly instead of skirting along the edges indefinitely.  Its all about living fearlessly. All my life I have worked at releasing the fears that restrict my experience of life. I am still determined! So who wants to talk about death?

Let Death lose its Sting...

They say that death is our ultimate fear and all other fears can be traced back to the idea of death. The word itself makes us recoil. It means something is devoid of life, inanimate, inert, ended and without power of any kind. Our ego screams at the thought of its annihilation, the idea that we end or no longer exist. This is the human reaction to the death of the body.

In Religious Science we believe very differently; that life never ends, we are not our bodies, we are our consciousness and as such a unique part of Spirit which is infinite and ever expanding. Depak Chopra gives an example to illustrate this idea; your TV until it is turned on is inert but the signal information is always there no matter how long the TV has been off. So too with people when they die in the physical, their energy still exists, its just not channeled in a visible body. For this reason we are never separate from those who have left this plane of existence, though our energy/consciousness still expresses through our bodies it is also connected with the whole, as a wave in the ocean of being. Therefore we can still commune with our loved ones in consciousness and they with us. What a comfort when we truly deeply know this.


As an old friend of mine used to say I'd still rather have someone with skin on!!! Yes we miss those who have left us. I live 6,000 miles from my family but at any time I still gain great comfort in writing a letter to my mother which is an action that I take separate from her. This year as part of my artistic expression I began making collage portraits of my family members. It is one very satisfying way of spending time with the individuals I miss and love. I also get to acknowledge their unique traits and qualities and how they express those in life. My art pieces represent my experience of another individual, what I see in them and the connection we enjoy.
In the Workshop "Remembering with Joy" that I designed with my friend Mary Hylan this is the core idea; we focus on the beauty of a relationship and how we have been enriched by another, knowing that we can still draw joy from it, that we have gained from it and that every situation in life including loss is an opportunity to know our spiritual interconnectedness more deeply.
For details www.GratitudeandGrace.com

“Love is stronger than death even though it can't stop death from happening, but no matter how hard death tries it can't separate people from love. It can't take away our memories either. In the end, life is stronger than death.”

Step by Step

"The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one."- Mark Twain



On some mornings it's harder to get started than on others. And sometimes its those hard to start days that end up taking off and being the best or so I tell myself.

My cat Rosie woke me nice and early today. Thanks Rosie. ( She takes her duties very seriously some days, one of which is to ensure I am up and at it before 6am! ) so I took myself out for a walk in the coolness of the day knowing the pleasant temperature wont last here in Montrose, California for very long.

I became aware very quickly on my walk of two things - that a new local free paper was being distributed, they were everywhere, and that it was 9/11. Eight years since the twin towers collapsed and changed our lives forever on so many levels. Although my life was not directly impacted by the loss of a loved one I spent a few moments with those who had as I walked the pavements of my neighborhood. The grief and transformation the losses wrought on their everyday lives will be brought to the rest of us today so we might remember the preciousness of those lost and those that remain. I am reminded to not waste a day.

As I looked at the newspaper I picked up I am struck by the courage and faith of the people responsible for putting it out there. Flagging economy or no, they are going out on a limb to fulfil a need they see in our community. Life and hope springs eternal.

I think of the cycle of destruction and renewal and how it never stops, it can't as long as there is life. So to you and to myself I say go forward, one small task at a time and know the preciousness of today. Allow the evolution of that life work its way through you in whatever stage it appears, as destruction and loss or renewal and new beginnings. You cannot hold back the cycle of life.