Resources + Insights + Inspiration
for end of life planning and soulful personal development
Slowing Down for the New Dawn of Spring
Are you ready to flower and flourish, or is it time to pause? Get some insights from John O’Donohue’s “For the Interim Time.”
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Green Burial: the greenest way to “go”
When I was on the path to becoming a licensed funeral director, I was on fire with a sense of possibility. I imagined that I would be a hip, eco-friendly funeral-service provider appealing to people like me — someone who appreciates beauty, walks lightly on the earth...
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In the end, it’s all about relationships
Don is an author, retired minister and humanities professor and founder and member of various social-justice organizations. Of all his lifetime accomplishments, however, it’s his ability to cultivate meaningful relationships that’s serving him most in his final days....
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Cultivating Courage
Cultivating courage arose when my family and I visited Ottawa last summer and almost melted during the heatwave. My pre-teen daughter and I noticed how lush and green the lawns were at Parliament Hill. Back home in Vancouver, brown lawns were the norm due to drought and major watering restrictions.
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Imagine your death and enrich your life. Promise.
You know that you exist, and that some day you will die. This knowledge of your mortality can either be a terrible burden or a great opportunity to transform your life. The good news is that you get to choose! Consciously contemplating your death and mortality facilitates personal development and compassion and helps you become more self aware and in control over the choices you make in your life.
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Engage your core in these troubled times
Have you ever asked yourself why the 2016 US election campaign and other divisive xenophobic movements around the world are causing you such obsessive and personal angst? Well, besides the racism, increase of violence and hate crimes and the potential for global...
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Your mortality is an opportunity in disguise
Earlier this year, we both spent time actively being with the fact that we are going to die and we don’t know when; could be tomorrow, could be next week or 37 years from now. It changed our lives. We each wrote a Heart Will to be read at our end-of-life rituals, and Love Letters to our respective school-aged daughters to have when we die. The impact on us continues to be profound.
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No, I will not get rid of you.
My first and last encounter with Mrs. X was in the cooler. Mrs. X was a widow who died in hospital with her devoted son and daughter-in-law at her side. From her hospital room she was taken to the hospital morgue. With her son’s permission, she was then transferred...
read moreMother’s Day can be complicated
Mother’s Day can be complicated. It all depends on where you’re at in your relationship with your mother, motherhood, and mothering. In our work with people who see pragmatic end of life planning as an opportunity for personal growth and transformation, we help...
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A video and poem that will melt your heart
What are you up to this Father's Day? Is there some quality time scheduled with the dads or devoted paternal proxies in your life? Is this the day you give your dad a card to show your gratitude and appreciation? Or will you be thinking of him and wishing you could?...
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