How to Be With Someone Who’s Dying or Wants to Die
These are eloquent words by a fellow teacher and friend, Jeff Foster, on how best to care and be present with a loved one in the process of dying or who is wanting to die. And yet this is ultimately about how we can also be with ourselves and each other to know the tender richness of pure presence, while living daily life.
WHEN A FRIEND WANTS TO DIE
(I have sat with many who want death,
and the following seems to be true…)
When a friend feels ‘done’ with this life,
when their world no longer makes sense,
your simple listening can work wonders.
Cry with them. Wonder with them.
Be silent with them.
Follow their experience; stay close.
Witness them as they are today.
Look into their eyes without fear.
Tell them you love them,
and you would love for them
to stay around.
Validate their feelings, however painful.
Help them feel acknowledged in this world.
Saturate their experience with compassion.
They are going through a crisis of identity;
this is not the end, this is not the final scene,
only a cry for support, a heart dialling a heart.
Don’t offer clever answers now. Offer yourself.
Don’t preach and teach.
Don’t judge them, or make them feel wrong for thinking their thoughts.
Embrace them.
So they do not feel alone.
So they can touch upon their own courage.
Their capacity to withstand painful feelings.
And go on.
As the sky withstands the fiercest storms.
And goes on.
When a friend feels ‘done’ with this life,
when their world no longer makes sense,
love them even more!
Bow to their honesty, their courage;
and celebrate
the vast intelligence in them
that’s finally ‘done’
with all the
stinky
bullshit.
Fierce patience is required here:
a new friend is being born;
the old one was too small.
The ground is sacred now
because you are present
with your friend.
And in presence, there is hope.
– Jeff Foster
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