Series 6 Guidance: When Death Visits
We face death many times a day: a tornado obliterates a section
of town; companies close; we see a deceased animal upon the
road; a dream dies. With loved ones and those we admire it can
be more challenging, be they peoples, two leggeds, four leggeds,
and even Sacred Sites. Regardless, when death visits it is a time
for letting go and letting down.
In the following three vignettes, we look at how we can deal with
Death and Dying. Our experience can be:
• Hospitable
• Hostile
• Honorable
Welcome to MedicineSinging’s series When Death Visits.
Series Six Part One: Being Hospitable to Death
We must find a way wherein death is lived as a part of the fabric of our robe of many colors. A way that sees death as fierce, yet honorable. A way that grants hospitality to death and dying between our first day and our last.
We ask how we can be hospitable to death. Some of us find this question offensive, or unkind. Some of us with terrible memories of suffering link it to death itself and fear both suffering and death.
Remember this: If we approach something that may scare us, like a darkened wood, we have several choices; One, turn and run!
Two, press ahead with little or no preparation. Third, if we have learned to know the difference between lost and exploring; and if life and our choices have been equipping us for this moment, then we can change our belief about what lies before us. Or have transformed beliefs.
Perhaps we have found our spiritual or communal or cultural beliefs about death and dying to be helpful and supportive, and perhaps not. But this does not let us off of the hook, for each of us must decide our beliefs about this life experience of dying and death.
The transformation of the beliefs and images we have can be found to change. We separate our fears of pain and suffering from the moment of death itself. And slowly we can change our beliefs from hostile to hospital and then to honorable when contemplating or dealing with death and dying.
If we have disdain for death, when it comes to taking off this robe of many colors (our body) we cannot see the fierceness of death and dying, and its magnificence and immenseness, and its place in the universe. Then we are truly lost.
MedicineSinging hopes to suggest ways to make room for this fierceness of death in our lives. And when we do, when death visits, the path will be illuminated. Perhaps then we can find our way to grant hospitality to that which we call death.
What if…what if we could know for certain about all of this stuff about death and dying. Well, I guess we will all have to stay tuned to find out what happens when death visits. Until then:
How do we have an honorable death?
Welcome to Series Six Part Three: An Honorable Death.
When Death Comes to Stay:
What to do in the mornings after the loss of a loved one.
Stephen W Emerick PHD
When death of a loved one comes to stay (and there will be many times in your life that it will do so) it is important to know what to do.
Upon rising in the morning, first drink some pure water to hydrate from the nights restlessness.
Then find a source of smoke: it may be incense you have, or perhaps some Santo Palo sticks, or sage. You can easily get some dry leaves or twig to burn in a small bowl or on a stone. You want to be able to light this and see the smoke rise.
Then in quiet time, light this. As the smoke rises run your hands over the smoke so the smell enfolds your hands. You may do this for the rest of your body also.
This is ritual, an act of adoration and gratitude. Our own human scent is replaced by the scent of mother earth’s plants and takes it out to all the world and to the Creator. It tells the world we grieve, that our loss can be so immense it seems to fill the whole world. Yet in prayer and gratitude, arising on the scent of plant, it also tells another story.
This is the story of our love for this particular loved one. What it is we grieve. And we grieve because of what we loved about them. About how they touched our lives. Leaving a lasting impact.
No matter your faith or none at all, take time to pray, meditate, grieve, cry, give thanks, remember. And yes, this grief will change you, but love changes us as well.
And as we watch the smoke rising into the air and even fill the room or area where we are, we see that it appears to dissipate. It becomes part of the area around us, or the land where we are, and into the sky.
We are reminded this is how it is with love. We feel it deeply, feel its release in loss, and also (with time) find it fills our world again. The smoke has risen to tell the world of our love for them, filled the personal space where we are, and then fills us again. Full circle.
Thus, while we are grieving, we are comforted by place, presence, scent, and sacredness. What we thought had left forever was released and, in the releasing, has come to reside in us again. This is the way of grief and love.
Do this each morning as you need. For with dawn comes the first food of the morning – the light of the sun. As we feel it upon and then within our body, life is once again coming full circle. Day and Night. Life and Death, Birth again.
Most importantly, while ritual and ceremony will help a great deal, you are the sacred place wherein the loved one comes to reside. And the scent abides with us, appearing to dissipate yet in reality embeds itself within us in sacred muscle-memory remembrance. Any other time we do this, this scent re-minds us. Re-binds us… to the loved one and their story in our life.
Stephen