A wise person once said, “There are three things I’ve learned to never discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.” Maybe this person wasn’t so wise since they were a fictional child who loved their blanket (if you didn’t know I’m talking about Linus from It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, you clearly weren’t a kid growing up in the 80s; that was a Halloween staple). Religion, politics, and money are said to be the three things we should never discuss, yet those are my favourite topics to bring up. No, I’m not someone who loves upsetting people, but I enjoy hearing other people’s perspectives, especially since they can help me shape my own. If your goal is to learn from someone else and not prove your own point, you can avoid fights and learn some great things no matter the topic. I share this because the people who follow this “don’t discuss rule” will want to add the question I’m about to recommend to their list of unmentionables. I think my question is brilliant (I’m clearly biased) because the answer should actually shape how we live our lives. And what’s this potentially controversial yet valuable question? (Clearing throat) How do you want to die? See? This is not the normal question a normal person will casually ask in a normal discussion to a group of normal people sitting at a normal table. And it should definitely not be casually asked while on the bus to a stranger: (naïve person) “How do you want to die?” (random person now terrified) “Not by you or on this bus.” Not only can this question be helpful, it can be a lot of fun (does that make me sound twisted?) Many people think they want to die at an old age in their sleep, but I want to give people a better story than that: “Did you hear how Chad died? It was awesome!” I don’t know about you, but when I’m in heaven, I want a better story than “Sleep is dangerous.” I want the tragedy to be my death and not the way my life ended: (person in heaven) “I died in my sleep alone in a nursing home not having seen my family in years… or maybe it was hours. I don’t know. I spent the end of my days feeling useless and never doing anything. I just stared at the TV… or maybe it was a painting? Either way, it was boring.”
Second Hand Lion (a fantastic movie), opens with two of the main characters having just died after crashing a homemade stunt plane – that’s a story. They are said to have “Died with their boots on,” which means they died doing something they loved and/or they died with a bang. When I’m in heaven, I want something worth sharing like that. I don’t want to fade away; I want to leave my mark and not just marks in my diapers.
In last week’s lesson I mentioned that one of my favourite exercises is to list the five things you want said at your funeral because it helps tell us how we should be living. This means if I want to be remembered as someone who was nice, I shouldn’t be yelling at store employees, not tipping wait staff, or not waving thank you after cutting people off (I could try to stop cutting people off, but that’s not happening (written smiling to myself)). What’s interesting is during my three-year addition, wanting to follow my list caused me a lot of extra stress because one of my goals is I want people to say I lived some great adventures. At first, I thought this build was holding me back from that goal, which caused me resentment toward it. In the last year, however, I started recognizing how this build was its own adventure. I wasn’t travelling the world or doing anything exceptional, but that’s not what was on my list. On my list was being someone who lived some adventures, which means having stories to share, and that’s exactly what this build had done. Seeing it as a three-year adventure helped me appreciate the journey a lot more. It just took a different perspective. Also on my list is someone who was a good provider for his family, which means I should be grateful for having work. I shouldn’t be resentful of how much I work because this is ultimately giving me my goal and allows me to achieve other goals. My list also includes I helped my family feel like a priority. This means I need to be careful not to let my writing leave my kids feeling like they’re second place. I often have to remind myself of that like the other day when I wanted to work on my book, but I played a boardgame with my daughters instead. Knowing our life goals will help us live better.
My question, “How do you want to die?” falls in line with this exercise because it helps guide us for how we should live. For instance, my dad passed away when he was 63 after having his second heart attack. Since heart disease is in my family, I should be careful how I live in order to increase my chances of longevity. This includes maintaining healthy stress levels and a physically healthy body. Of course, if dying younger is my goal (and currently it’s not), I can take up smoking, drinking, eating lots of fast food while laying on a couch, and eliminating all healthy social ties – tempting.
So what can talking about this question (and death in general) look like?
I would guess one of the five things on my dad’s list of things he’d want said at his funeral (to go back to my exercise) was that he was able to teach his three kids valuable life lessons in order to help them be healthy adults. His death, it turns out, achieved that in a major way since it taught me the greatest lessons I’ve ever received. Since seeing the good that comes out of a situation is the most important part of healing, this realization that came a year later was the most helpful step forward in my healing journey. My dad’s passing opened my eyes from my sheltered, safe existence to realize how fragile life is and that we will all have major hardships to face, but what will hit and when will vary depending on the person. If given the choice, I’d rather my situation of being raised in a loving home with a dad who died when he did rather than having parents who both live into their 80s, but got divorced when I was little. I choose quality over quantity. I’m sure others, would choose differently, but the reason I point this out is this kind of comparison can help us feel grateful even when we face a traumatic situation: My situation could be worse, so I should be grateful.
Tip: My dad wasn’t afraid to talk about death, and that helped him make sure he didn’t leave a terrible mess behind him for his family to clean up, which allowed us the opportunity to focus more on grieving.
My dad’s passing changed my life because it forced me to see death in a new way – it’s going to happen. At my dad’s funeral I noticed the only body there that wasn’t sad was my dad. He was the only one not suffering and the only one who would never suffer again. He was spared seeing any of his close friends or family die because he was first. This realization freed me from the fear of death because if I have the choice of being the first to die or watch my siblings or wife die, I’m happy to go first. Is that selfish or wise? I’m not sure, but why would I want to live to 100 only to have to see everyone I love die. If I live to 100, there’s an increased chance I’ll have to bury at least one of my kids, which is one of the worst things anyone can experience. Since my dad died at 63, someone who was a 100 would’ve been 47 when he was born, which means at 100 you’re seeing a lot of people you saw as babies die before you. That sounds like torture to me.
How do I want to die? Early, but not too early. My mom has threatened that she has to go before me, which I get and will do my best to follow (she threatened to kill me if I died before her… however that would work). If given the choice, I would want to go how my dad did, but a few years later. After all, he was never weak or lost his sense of purpose or value – that’s pretty great. I want to “go out with my boots on” and not as a burden to anyone I love. I’m too proud to be dependent on anyone. That’s why I’d rather die like my dad and not like his oldest brother who passed at 83 after several years of fighting dementia. I’m sure my family would prefer the extra years with me, and if I wanted, I’d have the option of MAID if I didn’t want to get too far gone. But I also don’t want to put my family through that experience. Putting my cat down was awful. I can only imagine saying your final goodbyes to a family member in that way. At least a heart attack is out of our hands… so maybe if I reach the point of dementia starting, I’ll take up smoking, drinking, and eating lots of fast food.
My dad’s other brother watched both of his brothers die, which would be terrible. He then passed away at 85 a few months after discovering he had terminal cancer. I was told centuries ago this type of death would have been the way people would’ve wanted to die because it would give them a chance to say goodbye and prepare their soul. It can also give a chance for others to say goodbye and prepare themselves for the loss. I, for one, was very grateful to have a chance to make visiting my uncle a priority because without knowing the end is near it’s easy to push off visiting. I’m very grateful God gave me those few special moments where my uncle shared some stories about growing up best friends with my dad. At the same time, it’s hard leaving the room not knowing if that visit was the last. The one thing those visits confirmed is that a lot of our normal surface level conversations that are meant to be fun are future based: “Doing anything fun this weekend?” “Going anywhere this summer?” In this context, anything future based is depressing: “So what do you want to do before you die? You can’t do much, so I guess it’s limited to what meals you want to eat.” One of the hardest things was knowing that being in a hospice can cause some heavy mental torture for the residents since everyone there was just waiting to die – rough. Unless you have a hope of heaven, there’s very little hope to be found. Plus, any sense of peace about dying would come after working through a lot pain and fear. I know I might be okay with dying, but that’s easy when I’m not staring down the barrel. More specifically I should also recognize I was an outsider. Visiting my uncle was different for me because he wasn’t my dad. I can’t imagine how painful this experience would’ve been for my cousin. It would’ve been intense. With my dad we had the shock and pain after, but with my uncle there would’ve been the grief before and after with lots of stress and guilt about trying to visit as much as possible. What I do know is the better way to die is impossible to know, but it’s good to consider. Even more, losing a loved one is one of the hardest things we will face in life regardless of how it happens, which is why going earlier isn’t always the worst thing.
Please Note: I’ve shared how my dad and two uncles passed as a way to give their deaths more meaning. Using a loved one’s death to grow is one of the best things we can do to honor their life and death because it gives the experiences purpose.
This week may you consider and discuss how you want to die with a loved one in order to give you direction for how to live this year and into the future.
Rev. Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people (like me)
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