All Testimonials

The Desire Map Planner is an amazing companion to Willow’s heart-centred end-of-life planning. The planner is my weekly reminder of how my core desired feelings reinforce the core values by which I live my life. If your goal is to love fully and live well in this precious life, this tool will help you get there and keep you on track.

Reena Lazar, Co-Founder, Willow End-of-Life Education and Planning

The 7 Tools online program was the best thing I could have done for myself. I needed it more than I realized for my personal grieving and growth. It made me think about the things I had been hiding from, and opened up doors I didn’t even realize I could open. I now feel ready to walk beside other people on their end-of-life journey.

Tracey Thatcher, Horticulturist, End of Life Doula & Mother

As already practicing professional end-of-life doulas, it was an honour and pleasure to review the wonderful program designed with such insight and compassion by Willow founders Michelle and Reena. We highly recommend that people who want to explore their own experience of and/or beliefs about death and dying take advantage of this program. You will grow in ways you never expected and your lives will be enriched.

Alison Moore,Celebrant/End of Life Doula & Claudette Bouchard, End of Life Doula/Educator

End-of-life planning is not for the faint of heart but Michelle and Reena have created gorgeously packaged and step-by-step curriculum tools to help ease the discomfort for even the most reticent among us. In their 7 Tools program, you’ll be guided to consider what matters most to you and why, discover your fears/barriers and incomplete communications relative to this work, and determine which healthcare advance directives and before/after deathcare ideals you might want to choose for yourself. Treat yourself (and a friend and/or family member, too!) to the gift of this necessary, self-paced work. Your life (and eventual death) will be the better for it!

Danna Schmidt, Master Life-Cycle Celebrant® and EOL Soulsmith, Waypoint Ceremonies

Reena and Michelle are an essential community-building, capacity-increasing, and most especially heart-centered resource.

Jennifer Lorca, Registered Nurse + End of Life Doula, Walk With Me Care

 For my parents and me, the experience of attending your workshop opened a pathway for continued conversation, learning and growing together in relationship to our own journeys with death and dying.

Lesley Ormiston, Practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine

Reena and Michelle are rock-stars! Their approach to all things living and dying is full of love and practical wisdom. Without reservation, I recommend Willow’s tools to all those called to be of service as an End-of-Life Doula.

Deanna Cochran, Founder, CareDoula ® Certification Program and Author, Accompanying the Dying: Practical, Heart-Centered 

Reena and Michelle are pioneers. A magic combination of pragmatic and purposeful, Willow’s personal-discovery and planning tools will fire you up to get into action with your end-of-life planning and to live your best life.

Dr. Karen M. Wyatt, Author, 7 Lessons for Living from the Dying

Your courage and insight continue to astound, amaze and inspire me. I treat each email I receive from you as a precious pearl. I am immensely grateful for what you are doing and sharing with us all. I can’t thank you enough for who you are and what you have created through Willow EoL.

Prashant Ziskind, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Since taking your workshop a few years ago, I carry the awareness of my legacy in the back of my mind at all times. The beautiful thing is that if I died tonight in my sleep, it would be ok because I tell people every day how much I love and appreciate them and I’m constantly sharing the ideas that matter most to me. Your tools and support are full of love and wisdom and accompany me as I journey. I now live with advanced cancer. My path is 100% palliative and I’m blessed to find that beauty, joy and comfort are not as elusive as I used to imagine.

Siobhan Devlin, MLIS, Proud Graduate, UBC Library, Archives and Information Studies

I am a great fan of your work and I really love the way you are thinking about life and death. Love from Prague – the heart of Europe.

Dobešová, Celebrant and Manager, The Wood of Memories Natural Burial Ground

Departure Directions was a multi-layered experience full of revelations, tenderness, awe and humour, guided with skill and compassion by Michelle and Reena. It gave me an appreciation for life, making me more aware of living in the present and cultivating gratitude for the profound beauty of the world around me. I now have less fear of death and was able to overcome a years-long block about writing my will.

Anita Roberts, Educator, Author, Actor & Grandmother

I had no idea I would be sitting with these new experiences and feelings at the end of the four Departure Directions sessions. I had projected a certain image of what would happen after I die, and this circle opened up a whole landslide of new possibilities. I am actually getting excited about doing all of this stuff. That was pretty incredible.

Namgyle Jerry Ewen, Professional Speaker & Facilitator

This program addresses many areas that are essential for preparing for our deaths, so that we can better live our lives. It made it easy for me to contemplate my death, and therefore plan for what is most important in my life.

Colleen Kelly, Life Enthusiast

7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death is a valuable, pragmatic and concrete tool to sustain my commitment to live my life with meaning and intention. The workbook is the perfect companion for self exploration or can be used as a starting point for heart-to-heart conversations with the people close to you. The workbook does not dictate what to think or do. Rather, through their reflective and thought-provoking questions, Michelle and Reena draw out our authentic and vulnerable selves and it left me more motivated to take the next step.

iris paradela, Mother and Event Organizer

Through a series of clear-eyed questions and reflective exercises, 7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death invites the reader to assess their values, memories and life experiences and to use these as a guide for end-of-life planning. Making arrangements for death is never easy, but ignoring it is even worse and can leave loved-ones in the lurch. This workbook gets right to work helping make an overwhelming chore appear effortless.

Roy Ellis, Bereavement Coordinator, Nova Scotia Health Authority, Palliative Care

Willow has created a gentle, thoughtful and practical resource that is sure to inspire deep reflection and positive change.

Tracy Chalmers, End of Life Doula & Instructor, End of Life Doula Program, Douglas College

As a professional celebrant, the 7 Tools workbook is a resource I would recommend to all my clients. To fully understand the values, wishes and intentions of those who have died makes the grief process, and the creation of a memorial so much more meaningful.

Lisa Hartley, Professional Celebrant, Founder Simply Ceremony

With simple and practical questions, 7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death guided me to confront issues I had been reluctant to face before: Am I truly living my values? What are my feelings about Death? What messages will I leave to loved ones? The workbook challenged me to bravely consider the reality of my mortality and the reward is a feeling of joy, energy and growth.

Barry Fleming, Retired Business Manager

“Full of powerful questions, this beautiful inquiry brought me deeper into my heart — which is where I want to live from … more in the present, in creating my future with sacred intention.”

Danielle LaPorte, Creator of The Desire Map Program

Willow workshops have benefited me greatly and it’s wonderful to see this material available now in an online program. I recommend 7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death to everyone willing to explore life’s joys and mysteries and learn from the reality of our mortality.

Rudiger Krause, Lifelong Learner, Vancouver, Canada

I consider the 7 Tools workbook to be an essential component of any end-of-life planning. Contemplating and responding to these exercises will better prepare you (and others around you) to be the directing agent of your end of days. This workbook will only augment other planning work you have already done.

Ngaio Davis, Founder and Managing Director of KORU Cremation | Burial | Ceremony, Vancouver, Canada

This is a gorgeous workbook, both visually and in intention: its intention to bring each of us into the deepest and most vulnerable conversations with ourselves and others about our ultimate plans. Will we respect and embrace our mortality or sidestep it, allowing others to determine how we will be cared for and remembered? The number seven is a symbolic representation of perfection: in the Abrahamic traditions the Creator accomplished everything in 6 days and rested on the 7th. Can we, after having prepared through using the 7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death mindfully, consider resting in the knowledge that we are as prepared as we can be for the mystery of death?

Maureen Wicken, Educator and Retreat Leader, Vancouver, Canada

Even after twenty plus years working passionately in my profession as a deathcare worker, my heartfelt connection with your work is an eye opener for me. I read everything first with my professional eyes but soon realized just how powerful this information is for the reality of my mortality. The 7 Tools workbook is an incredible pre-planning tool that will bring a sense of peace and enlightenment.

Lorraine Fracy, Manager, Client Services & Administrative Operations, Royal Oak Burial Park, Past President British Columbia Funeral Association, Victoria, Canada

You may be tempted to avoid the difficult, dense topic of death. That would be doing yourself a disservice. Willow has unlocked the vault on a traditionally difficult topic, giving us a gentle, insightful, holistic approach that you can tailor to your needs, wishes and culture.

Lee-Anne Ragan, International Learning and Development Expert, Rock.Paper.Scissors Inc., Kenya, Nairobi

As a young man, my mortality is something last on my mind. Going through the program enabled me to think deeper into my own self while allowing me to grow as a man and appreciate my life for the value it holds, in this life and the next. This program also made me realize that to avoid stress on myself and my family down the road, it is important to have an understanding of what I want when I have moved on from this world. The value in Willow’s 7 Tools program is exceptionally positive.

Kyle Warkentin, BSc Candidate 2020, Kamloops, Canada

Every question you need to ask, every thought you need to have, everything you need to do — when it comes to thinking about and finding meaning in your life and death, Willow’s 7 Tools program is the only place to go. Willow provides a clear, simple and beautiful way of entering and navigating the most complex of topics…combining practical planning savvy with a lot of heart.

Danielle Kershaw, University Career Coach and Founder, Career Bakerie, Vancouver, Canada

Planning can be difficult for even the day-to-day aspects of life so it’s no wonder we avoid it around something as challenging as our inevitable death. These questions, information, and tools in this program make the process of facing our death slightly less daunting – almost as though there is someone holding our hand as we reflect and write. In my professional life as a reflexologist with clients in various states of health, this program will be what I recommend when asked for a resource around end of life planning and reflection. And although the program was created in Canada, it’s completely adaptable to the UK and, I assume, other countries as well.

Christine Shepherd, Reflexologist, Guernsey, United Kingdom

As a massage therapist who specializes in supporting people living with and dying from cancer, I worked closely with Willow to explore my own mortality. As a result, when I was wheeled into urgent care for a life-threatening emergency, I was as ready as I could be to face my own death. The 7 Tools for Making Sense of Life & Death is a powerful resource to dive into this process. The program offers comfort, clarity, and peace of mind. It will be one of my first recommendations when a client or their family member is facing a terminal diagnosis.

Cathy Byers, Massage Therapist specializing in Oncology Massage, Calgary, Canada

This workbook is a wonderful resource! We live in a culture in denial of death. Here are accessible and insightful tools that help us to turn facing the truth of our mortality into a profound opportunity for connecting with what gives our lives meaning and joy.

Beverly Spring, Palliative Care Physician, Vancouver, Canada

I’ve never felt so connected to people in such a fast, safe way, as I did in the Legacy, Love Letters + Heart Wills workshop. Michelle’s and Reena’s sharing, vulnerability, and authenticity gave us allowance and permission to do the same. It was ground-breaking, transformative, and essential reflections for the soul.

Helena Cynamon, Producer & Strategic/Impact Storyteller

Reena and Michelle create an open and safe environment while still providing structure and focus. The Legacy, Love Letters & Heart Wills workshops series totally changed my life – I’m very much aware now about the type of legacy I want to leave. This work also provides a wonderful foundation for my career in funeral services, enabling me to be more empathetic and present with the families I care for. Thanks to you, I now have a presence in my life that just simply wasn’t there before.

Ashley Irving-Scott, Apprentice Funeral Director