Life is short. Here’s how to cherish every day of it.
“I want a party in the woods with an all-night campfire. I’ll be off to the side in a sleeping bag, nice and cozy. There will be s’mores and cocktails. My friends can come and go, saying goodbye however they want, or just sitting quietly with me and holding my hand. Nobody should touch my feet, though. I hate having my feet touched. A playlist of my favorite songs should be on repeat. I’d like to die as the fire burns out at dawn. Lights out and lights out, you know?”
I’m on Zoom and a chaplain from Iowa is describing her ideal final hours of life. We’re training to become end-of-life doulas, and this morning’s assignment is to help each other talk through a final hours ritual. It’s one of many exercises designed to confront us with our own mortality, so we can leave our own feelings about death at the door before we step across someone else’s threshold to help with theirs.
End-of-life (EOL) doulas are at the opposite end of the life cycle spectrum from birth doulas. They provide non-clinical care (emotional, logistical, and physical) and help with planning; engage with life reviews and legacy work; and provide support for family and friends so caretakers can bring their best, rested selves to support their dying loved one.
I knew training to become a doula would change my relationship to death, but I didn’t anticipate how it would transform my day-to-day life. Like others, my smartphone use skyrocketed during the isolation of the pandemic. Even after those panic-inducing first months in NYC, I still found myself using my phone as a constant distraction — lurking on Instagram, clicking every New York Times alert, obsessively refreshing my email like it was a Vegas slot machine.
I didn’t become an end-of-life doula to fix my fragmented focus. I did it because Covid-19 made death suddenly feel very real and very present. But I found that a deep dive into death work profoundly clarified my priorities, and has helped me spend time in ways more aligned with those priorities thanks to the soul-shaking understanding that our time here is truly limited.
Here are three components of EOL doula training that have been useful in my never-ending quest to live a more present and focused life in this Age of Endless Distractions. Think of it as a looking-back-from-your-imagined-deathbed approach to living — which sounds morbid in theory but is empowering and enriching in reality.
Imagine you have three months to live
I’m not going to lie to you: This exercise isn’t going to feel great! Please do it only if you feel equipped to engage with feelings of grief and loss. I recommend having someone you trust read it to you, someone who also has the emotional bandwidth and who is not currently grieving. You’ll need a pen and paper. Choose a time when you’re not going to feel rushed and are in a comfortable space. Take some deep breaths. Settle in. Here we go.
Write down your five most-prized possessions, your five favorite activities, your top five values, and the five people you love the most.
Close your eyes. Imagine you’re at a doctor’s office. You’ve just been given a terminal diagnosis and told you have approximately three months to live. Sit with that news. Breathe. Open your eyes. Cross any four items off your list.
Close your eyes. You’re back home with your spouse or friends or children or pet. You have to find a way to tell those you love: “I’m dying.” Breathe. Open your eyes. Cross another four items off your list.
Close your eyes. You’ve started feeling the effects of your illness. You can’t get around as easily. Your sleep is restless. You’re nauseated from the medications you’re taking. Breathe. Open your eyes. Cross four more items off your list.
Close your eyes. You’re mostly confined to your bed now. Your loved ones have gathered because they know they will soon have to say goodbye. They drift in and out of your bedroom, or wherever you have chosen to spend your final days, holding your hand, perhaps playing music you like or reading aloud your favorite book. Breathe. Open your eyes. Cross four more items off your list.
Close your eyes. You’re in bed, eyes closed, unable to move much or to speak at all. You sense that you’re going to die soon, and you wonder what will happen when you go. What are you thinking about in these final moments? Breathe. Open your eyes. Cross the remaining four items off your list.
Whew. You did it. Make sure to give yourself as much time as you need to regroup before you reenter the “real world.” Sit still. Focus on your breath. Drink lots of water.
When I did a version of this exercise, I was amazed at how real loss and grief felt as I crossed items off my list. (There is nothing quite like imagining your kid’s life without you to bring on The Sobs.) I don’t want to overstate the impact of imagining loss versus actually experiencing it, nor minimize our individual, multi-faceted responses to real grief, but research has shown that stressful life events can change us, and that includes clarifying our values and priorities. Maybe you, like me, tapped into some of that clarity during this exercise.
A few days after I tried this exercise, I rewrote my Top 20 list on a notecard. I keep that notecard by my laptop and look at it often. It has been an unexpectedly powerful reminder of what and who I love, of who I am and want to be. Each day I think about how to fit in as much as I can from this list, even if I only have a few free minutes to myself. It has become the framework that informs my daily to-dos and balance of urgent/important tasks.
Practice deep, active listening
A good deal of EOL doula work is listening work. The deep, active listening doulas are trained for involves holding back our own stories, comments, and feelings. Doulas don’t tell a dying person what to do. They don’t try to fix the situation. They ask open-ended questions and understand that how people move through the dying process is up to them. This kind of listening requires empathy and restraint. It insists on being free from distractions, external (cellphone notifications, I’m looking at you) and internal (like that voice inside your head that wants to judge or give advice).
As the person at a party who makes approximately 30 seconds of obligatory small talk before diving into deeply personal conversations with strangers, I assumed I was custom-built for this part of being a doula. But it can be difficult to stick to open-ended questions, to sit comfortably in silence, or to resist giving well-meaning but unsolicited advice.
So, I’ve been practicing. A lot. This kind of listening has altered what I can only think to call the texture of my time. It has made me more present, empathetic, and curious in conversations and relationships.
The next time you’re having a conversation with someone who is sharing important information or struggling in some way, you might try it. Ask open-ended questions. “How are you feeling about X?” “Do you want to talk more about Y?” Give their answers space and silence to settle.
Reflect back what you think you’ve heard. Be open to being wrong about what you think you’ve heard. Be supportive, but don’t try to fix the situation with advice or talk them out of what they are feeling. Avoid platitudes like “give it time” or “it wasn’t meant to be.” Even “I know how you feel,” well-intentioned though it is, often misses the mark because we mostly don’t know exactly how someone else feels or entirely understand their specific situation.
Of course, not all our conversations require this therapist-like level of restraint, but challenge yourself to consider that plenty of them could benefit from a touch more deep listening.
Legacy projects in the here and now
Doulas often help with legacy projects: autobiographies, letters to loved ones, art projects, and more. These projects memorialize a person’s passions and creativity, values and contributions, and — spoiler alert! — you don’t have to wait until you or someone you love is dying to work on one.
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