The brain has a shield which insulates it from thoughts of death.
Archives
A funeral is the ultimate distress purchase
If even doctors can’t talk about death, it’s hardly surprising that the rest of us ignore it too.
Where do you expect to be buried?
Early humans built houses for their dead before they built houses for themselves.
Soil to Soil
It took thousands of years before we replaced ‘earth to earth’ with ‘ashes to ashes’. Now it’s time for ‘soil to soil’.
Compassion in Dying
A good life should end with a good death.
How to Prepare for Your Digital Death
We live many lives, and for most of us, we increasingly live online: not just through social media, but for our banking and utilities as well. Thankfully there are now quite a few useful guides available, and while you can read them online, what they will all tell you is that you need to create an … Continue Reading
Rites of Passage
Can you imagine attending your own funeral? The old joke is that it’s the best party you’ll never go to, but that may no longer be true.Last year, in his Channel 4 series Grayson Perry helped to create a ‘living funeral’ for Roch, a man who’d been living with Motor Neurone disease, and it was … Continue Reading
Grayson Perry – Rites of Passage
I’ve long been a fan of Grayson Perry. Not just of his work as a potter which is as subversive as it is beautiful, but also of his clear-eyed attempts to understand and explain the human condition. He’s a gifted communicator, whose easy directness allows him to connect with people from all cultures and walks of life, and … Continue Reading
A Funeral for a Humanist
I know it sounds odd, but it’s not often I’m asked to conduct a funeral for a humanist. Lots of people want a humanist ceremony, but what they really want is, “something that’s not religious where we can talk about the person that we love”. We did that for Leslie too: his son Ian delivered a … Continue Reading
The Ideal Death Show
It sounds like a lot of fun! Read the full piece here: it’s very well written, by Hayley Campbell of Buzzfeed