Dying Matters

Well, aloha, and welcome to the Secret Art of Huna live. And today I wanted to talk about death, dying, loss, and bereavement. And there’s two reasons for that, really. One is that it’s Dying Matters week. Dying Matters is a charity that encourages people to talk about death, dying, and particularly death and dying. And the other is that I’ve been working,

I’ve been volunteering, as a chaplain, an interface chaplain, in a hospice for the last 18 months. And sadly that’s coming to an end because the hospice is closing on the day that I normally would go in there. So I’m not gonna be doing that anymore.

But it’s an opportunity to reflect on some of the things that I’ve learnt working with people who are either dying or who are caring for people with life-limiting illnesses or who are facing bereavement. So I did a short video on this back in March, but it was very short because it was raining a lot.

So I thought today I’d do something a little bit longer to talk about the subject. And I know it’s a tricky subject. It’s a tricky subject for a lot of people because we often don’t wanna face up to our own mortality or the mortality of those that we love.

And when we do lose somebody that we love, very often it’s like, well, what right do I have to grieve? What right do I have to implode slightly? Everybody dies. It’s a normal part of the life-death process. So I know that it’s a tricky subject and that’s one of the reasons why I think it’s really important to talk about it from time to time.

So firstly, let’s just start with the death and dying and the Dying Matters question. Have you made a will? Have you had conversations with your loved ones about what you want to happen when you die? Have you sorted out power of attorney in case you get sick and not in a position to make decisions either about your financial status or about the status of your health, what you want to happen to you if you are that sick.

And power of attorney ensures that somebody has the authority to make those decisions should you find yourself in that situation. Really important. Do your family, your loved ones, the people who matter, do they know what your funeral wishes are?

It’s much easier, speaking of somebody who designs funerals, it’s much, much easier to design a funeral and there’s much less likely to be dispute in the family about what should go in and what should not go in if you’ve actually said what you want to be in your funeral.

Do you want it to be a religious ceremony or not? Do you want it to be a cremation or do you want a burial? Do you want it to be woodland or do you want it to be in a cemetery, if you’re talking a burial? So have you had those conversations? ‘Cause they’re all really, really important conversations to have. So that’s the me-preparing-for-my-own-death bit.

There’s also the more, I don’t know, the more emotional side. Have you forgiven the people that you needed to forgive? One of the things that, it’s very clear from the hospice work, not just the work that I’ve done, but from hospices around the world, where they’re working with people who are facing death, that people who have forgiven seem to have a much easier time of it.

It’s like the forgiveness process releases hurt, revenge, anger, and tension, and it allows the individual to die more freely. They’ve done research with using, apparently there’s a thing called forgiveness therapy, and working with people who are coming towards the end of life, and those who’ve had forgiveness therapy, those who didn’t have forgiveness therapy.

The ones who had forgiveness therapy, which is very much about the doing of the forgiving, had a much easier time of it than the ones who hadn’t had the forgiveness therapy.

So forgiveness really plays a big part in your experience of your own end of life. Have you thought about what your beliefs are about what happens to you after you die? Some people believe in an afterlife. Do you believe in an afterlife? Do you believe that you go to some place, some hangout? Do you believe that you come back? Do you believe none of this, that death is just the end?

But having some sense of what it is you believe and just, yeah, thinking about that, it can really help with easing the process of dying. And then there’s your family. Have you spoken to your family about your death, how they might feel about you dying? Have you spoken to your family about the importance of them letting go?

Because it’s, there seems to be a point at when, that there’s a point of death where it’s almost as though the soul or the essence of you hangs around for a little while, and easing the passage of that hanging around of the soul. The Hawaiians believe that the soul would hang around for quite awhile, and that every time that you thought of somebody, then you stopped them from totally leaving.

So from a Hawaiian perspective and from a spiritual perspective, if you do believe in reincarnation, that you come back, or if you do believe that your soul leaves at the time of your dying, what have you done to ensure that people don’t spend time dwelling on you and thinking about you, let you go?

Mornah Simeona, who is the great proponent of forgiveness, Mornah Simeona told all her students to let her go, to do Ho’oponopono, to cut the cords of forgiveness and so let her go. So I’ve got a very strong belief in the value of the forgiveness process in bereavement because it really does help you cut the cords, the connection, with the person who’s gone, and also then, anytime you think of them, you’re thinking of them in a new context because you’ve forgiven them.

Very often we, that feeling of how dare you go? How dare you leave me behind? Or if they’ve been ill. How dare you be sick? And it’s not something necessarily we can voice to the world because we might feel ashamed of feeling that, but it’s a very natural feeling.

It’s a very normal feeling, a normal experience of really being angry with the person who’s gone, not just sad, but angry because they went. Or perhaps angry because there were things that had been left undone, that can’t be done now because they’ve left, because they’ve gone.

So forgiveness is a great way of setting a new context. In terms of your own bereavement, so if you’re the person who’s lost somebody, then I really, really think that bereavement counselling can be so helpful, particularly if you haven’t, you’re a year on after the bereavement, you’re 18 months, two years, and you still haven’t really dealt with the bereavement. Because it can act like real stress in the body.

I’ve known people who, it’s almost like PTSD, bereavement, the stress that it brings into the body and the not dealing with the feelings around the bereavement, particularly where the bereavement is a shock. The person was young, perhaps, or was not expected to die. Or maybe it’s a child or a grandchild or a niece or a nephew, somebody who died very young and shouldn’t have gone before you.

So bereavement counselling can be really helpful in releasing that stress or making sure that that stress doesn’t hang around. So have you been listened to? Have you listened to yourself? Have you allowed yourself time to grieve? It’s so important. I know, until I lost, the first of my parents to die, so which, my dad. Until I lost my dad I’d never really had a major bereavement.

My grandparents had died when I was in my 20s, but they were elderly, it was expected, and certainly for both of them, actually, it was a real release. So when my dad died, which was surprising. He was 78, relatively young. He hadn’t been ill. There was no. It was a shock, a surprise.

It took a long time for me to get over it and I didn’t take much time to deal with it at the time because I was looking after my mum who was really going through it, and because my father’s death was the first of three in the period of about 10 days. He went, and then my best friend from university went, so she was the same age as me, and that was a surprise, and then my mother’s sister.

So it was a hard time and I didn’t really resolve it at that time. I didn’t give myself the chance to grieve. It’s important, giving yourself the chance to grieve, the time to grieve, the space to grieve, the permission to grieve, even when you’re trying to hold everything together, you’re trying to, you’re doing the death certificate and you’re trying to figure out the will, if there was one, and you’re trying to close down the bank accounts and do all the admin stuff that comes after a death, even after you’ve done that, allow yourself that time.

Give yourself that permission because yeah, death, usually we’re sad when we lose someone. And why not own it? Because it’s part of life.

So that’s my thoughts for today. Hope it’s been useful. Love to hear your comments and thoughts on the subject of death, dying, and bereavement and loss. And I’ll talk to you again very soon.

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