“Death is a crisis which should be shared by all members of the family. Children are too often forgotten by grieving adults. Silence and secrecy deprive them of an important opportunity to share grief.”
~~Rabbi Earl A. Grollman
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ya know i find this interesting and think i ultimately disagree with rabbi grollman.
i personally think it’s incorrect to view death as a crisis. how can something that’s natural, immanent and part of universal order be perceived as a crisis? why b/c we as humans continue to live in denial and ego based selfishness?
death, even when “untimely”, is the way the universe sustains and maintains balance. simply put, karmic balance is not always fair.
if we took more time and taught our children this way, then such occurrences wouldn’t be a “crisis”.
we metabolize information/events/people just like the body does food. if we change they way we metabolize events – the outcome could much more positive and fruitful.
I’m really glad you took the time to post a comment. And I really like what you have to say!
I think in some people’s assumptive world, any breech like a loss is a crisis. For too many people, death is an insult to their world-view. We have gone a long way away from thinking that death is a normal and sometimes healthy part of life. Look at cases that have been in the media in terms of palliative care or the fight in Oregon for the “right to die”… (which even when a person has the means, most do not use… but it gives them comfort to know that they have options … true in Oregon as it is in places in Europe… )
I think there is a balance between meeting people where they are at with their view and trying teaching a different way. I wouldn’t try to tell a parent that what they were experiencing was anything different than how they felt about the loss of a child. I would work with them to look for empathy and compassion for other parents who had a similar loss and who were losing an ill child. And then, with time, I would support them in looking that the constructs that we or they have lived by. The same would be true of other relationships lost.
What I have learned over the years is that we always start where someone is at and then see where the journey goes. Dying and death can be a beautiful time, filled with miracles, gifts, and life-altering moments but we can’t make anyone see it that way or experience it that way. At some time though, we need to look at how we teach our children and model to them. I think some lessons a person has to be open for… and I think that this is often one of them… but to hold the hope and idea that it can be a different way is a huge beginning.
But, what you hit on is EXACTLY what my graduate work is on… what if your worldview is different? What if you meditate on your own death daily? What if you believe that here and now is the only thing we have? What if …. so many other things that are part of our post modern and transpersonal understandings of the world become our experience and not just abstractions…. What a fascinating time to be alive, to be working with our “stuff”, and realizing that we have options into how reality is…
I think that we have a great opportunity in teaching the young the view point that you present. There is sooooo much to unpack in the conversation… for instance, the idea of “ownership” in a relationship… or permanence… or thousands of other things.
If you look at some of our beliefs, such as a child will outlive a parent, these were not beliefs that have been held during other times in the world. They are a product of our 20th century technology driven world, with a huge belief in medicine being able to fix all. Death is such a taboo still and people have such passionate ideas about it that it is hard to unpack all of our society’s assumptions and fears around it.
I also think it will be interesting to see where we go with our ideas and experiences of grief in the next 100 years… as institutions try to pathologize grief, as medicine keeps people alive longer and longer, and our ethics and practices continue to lag behind.
This is truly a topic that could fill a few dissertations… and hopefully at least one…
Thank you for giving us all something to think about, the seeds of seeing that dying and death can be different than what we have perceived it as…
With Lovingkindness,
Jennifer
always and thank you for having me – the honor is mine
indeed, we forget that through death direct and indirect elevation occurs. for example, if martin luther king jr. wasn’t assassinated , president obama simply wouldn’t be. if the holocaust didn’t happen, the united states would be what is it today…etc…
you’re right, we are sooo used to holding on to the past that we miss now and forgo our “future” by tainting it with the ego’s denial.
i went to see oprah live on monday and she said:
“now is the moment that last forever”
“the past is gone. the future is not here. now i am free of both”
the entire human experience is transitory and we have to remember we live in consciousness manifested – not in temporal physicality.
in love and light!