Preparing to Die . . . The Final Season
Preparing to Die… The Final Season
My friend, Elinor is a deep thinker. She doesn’t mind admitting she hit the big “7-0” last year, which is a milestone. Out of the blue one day she said to me: “I just had a bolt of realization! I am preparing to die!!” Sounds pretty morbid, right?
But being in the funeral business, we are surrounded with death and dying and helping those who are grieving. When we can, we encourage people to pre-pay and pre-plan their funeral to save themselves money and extra stress when the time comes. This is all good and something we strongly believe in –
but no, that is not where this blog is going.
What Elinor said got me to thinking about the seasons of most of our lives.
First, we are children. We are gaining knowledge rapidly from an educational standpoint. We are learning how to relate in our small circle of family and close friends. We branch out to preschool, through high school to higher learning, and continue our growth and development. We make lots of stupid mistakes during this phase, but we aren’t aware of too many of them.
Next comes career and creating a family. We work hard to accumulate worldly goods and start building a career. We save for college for our children and weddings and hopefully set aside funds towards retirement. We take vacations and travel a little. We buy stuff we don’t need and are usually wasteful. We develop more of our character during this time, because we also have to impart it to our children. We make more stupid mistakes, but now we are aware of them.
After that comes the season of the empty nest, the grandchildren phase, and all the fun that brings. If one is fortunate, self-evaluation and life evaluation are stronger in this phase. We are becoming quite comfortable with who we are. We really would like to tell people what we have learned from our mistakes, but usually no one listens.
This brings us to the last season: Preparing to die!
Here are some components I want to consider . . .
- Financial: I will want to be sure that my will or trust and accounts have been evaluated and will stand scrutiny when I am no longer here to defend or change them. My vested powers are how I want them.
- Stuff: I want to be sure that I give away the important things to those I intend them for. I want to see the smiles while I am still here. I want the pictures marked so no one has to say “Who is that? Or, “How are we related?” I want to divest myself of the unimportant so that others won’t have to handle it when I am gone.
- Bucket List: My bucket list will contain the places I have not visited that I still yearn to see. But what about overcoming some of my remaining fears? What about the unread books, unheard music, giving of myself in service to others once the working years are completed? As I check some off, I have no doubt I will add more.
- Relationships: I will want to be sure, that inasmuch as possible I mend any broken relationships. I want to contemplate everyone in my close immediate world. If I have knowingly hurt anyone, I will want to be quick to ask for forgiveness. I will want to be sure those I love now exactly how I feel and nothing is left unsaid or undone.
I will say “I love you” a lot.
- Health: I will want to pay the closest attention I ever have to what I eat, how I rest, my exercise regimen, good mental health and a positive attitude, taking care to fix what’s broken when I can.
- Emotional: The final phase of life will most certainly include some health issues I can’t fix. It will include saying good-bye to friends and relatives who die before me. I need to be able to face these things courageously. I will need to be realistic about possible “sudden fears” of not knowing how to handle something in a weakened physical state or without those I have trusted and leaned on for years. I will need to stick together with my remaining friends and family and “be there” for each other. I will need to come to a place of internal peace with my circumstances, regardless… period!
- Spiritual: The most important of all. For me, personally, I need to know my relationship with God is in good standing and that things are fully settled according to my faith in Jesus Christ.
Finally, naturally being timid in certain areas, I would like to know that I can actually die bravely and with the certain knowledge that as I walk through “my own valley of the shadow of death”, I won’t fear the shadows. You know, shadows are only present when there is a light source. I shall hopefully be focusing on My Light, not the shadow. My Maker is pure light and if He is walking me across the valley, His light will always cast a shadow.
Until that day comes, I plan to be busy doing whatever the days holds. I love the poem “Because I could not stop for Death” by Emily Dickenson:
“Because I could not stop for death..
He kindly stopped for me..
The Carriage held but just Ourselves..
And Immortality… “ Click the link to read it all.
A little serious? Sure. Morbid? Nah, I don’t think so. It is a reality that faces each of us and we do have to accomplish what the seasons set forth. From birth to death, it is what it is.
What season are you in? Are you making the most of it? Each season is the building block for the next. Will you end up having the courage it takes for the final season?
38 Comments
To everything, turn..turn…turn…
There is a season, turn..turn…turn…
And a time for every purpose under heaven.
Sing it, Chris…a time to be born, a time to die…. Thanks for commenting.
Anne, thank you for sharing and for talking openly about the journey. Yes there continue to be people who unfortunately don’t address the fact that none of us lives forever. When we don’t have things in place before we pass away, then we leave the burden to our family/friends to try and figure out what it is we wanted as our celebration of life and can the family afford it if we didn’t preplan our services and didn’t have an estate plan so that all of resources are now tied up in probate.
I believe there is a joy in acknowledging that we are not on this earth forever — we are then free to make up our “bucket list” and enjoy places and people. We also realize the importance of telling people how we feel about them and why they are so special to us while they are with us. When we say it to the wind after they have left us, we won’t see their expression, we won’t hear their response, we won’t receive that special hug.
Barbara
Thank you so much for taking time to respond to my blog on the final season. You definitely point out an important aspect and that is the total relief that comes when one has their final plans in writing and most of it covered financially.
There comes a time when most of us will feel we have lived enough. Others will go out kicking and scratching because they want to do “one more thing”. Hugs to you and have an awesome holiday season. Anne
Anne
What an inspiration you are to those around you. I find great pleasure in your writing and personal experience. We are all in different seasons in our lives but the end is still the same. I like you value my relationship with God. I work very hard at being the best I can be and the best to others. There are days that I fail but I ask for forgiveness and get up and try again.
Thank you for always sharing so much of yourself with us. You are truly a woman of God.
Amy
Amy,
Thank you so much for your support to the blogs. All we can be is our best. We all struggle with different things. I guess if the struggles actually end there is nothing more to learn!
I love the concept of forgiveness. Every day is a new beginning with no mistakes in it…yet! Then we get out of bed. Haha.
Big hugs,
Anne
Annie
You and I are both on the same track. Looking back at what we have seen, done, accomplished, and knowing that this time of our lives is the most precious. If we can impart to the younger ones, how important it is to remember all of the things you so clearly laid out, we know they would be much better off. But our lives are our own. And their journey is not ours. All we can ever do is be a shepherd and someone who has walked the walk.
Nicely done, and thank you!
Pat
Pat,
We sure are on the same track. Life becomes more and more precious with every passing day. I think the healthy realization that it is the final stretch, and yet we still have our health, minds, energy, though not as great as before, and a whole lot more experience makes us know we have to stay busy and focus on the goals that still need to be realized.
You are right. If someone asks, we are happy to share, but each one has their own journey.
Love you
Annie
Anne,
Your thoughts and comments on them are as provocative as ever.
In this still new career as a Pre-Arrangement Counselor, I find myself ironically, as a “newKid” and, with this clientele, a “young” guy again who is still listening to his next group of elders..but now…ever more patiently so without getting irritated.
Some days, the job is, well, nothing extraordinary…and then it hits home DEEP REALIZATION HERE…that I am talking to my own future. I am conversing with a temporary soul mate with my same struggles, struggles that they have already faced that I am just facing or know that I will face, that has my opinions that they have honed thru similar life experiences. It is a wonderful bonding, serendipity moment, that I enjoy both in happy and sad ways.
Sometimes I make friends, ever so temporary, in unusual places or circumstances, knowing due to life circumstances that they are only for the moment. This continues for me here with the people I encounter thru OCM.
They remind me, make me think, as you have, about what I still need to accomplish, plan for, take care of , love, do, feel, take responsibility for, push myself to stop and enjoy the moment for (stop Greg!, just stop!), sow strength and stamina…and realize that I will not, will not, live longer than what is my time, so keep taking responsibility is the motto. Keep doing things so that others will not be burdened when I am gone. I am lucky to know that in doing these things, accomplishing them, FINISHING them, will bring me a Peace that lasts and is not transitory.
May your Peace, and all the varied parts of it, be deep and long and satisfying.
Your next door Buddy,
Greg
Greg,
Not to add any pressure, but you write with such soul, I tend to forget what you said and focus on the beauty of your words. What is keeping you from at least “guest blogging??
Let me back up now…You ARE talking about your own future, all of ours, eventually. That’s why each season is so important to handle well, isn’t it? And we are in this together. In our industry, we are either very much feeling and sensitive individuals or thinkers. The combination is dynamic.
Thanks for your succinct comments.
Anne