Death and Dying - Do we need to talk about it?

Why is it important to initiate conversations around death and dying?

I don’t think it is essential that everyone has to talk about it, but what is essential is to create a space for people who want to talk about it. People come to the subject for different reasons – grief or loss of a loved one or experiences like visitations. Sometimes people want to talk about death because they don’t know how much time they have, especially if they have been diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. For many years I worked in the US as a social worker in a support programme for people with cancer. Many of our patients said that facing the reality of their own mortality helped wake them up to live the life they wanted.

At a more pragmatic level, conversations around death help people to take responsibility for what they leave behind – what to do with their physical or material remains, possessions, debts and assets. Many people are comfortable thinking or talking about death and dying, but somehow have not found the time to write their last will, which is especially important if they have children. End-of-life health care decisions are also important to discuss and make clear to those who will be caring for you. The Farewell Group has created a form for Aurovilians to state and record their wishes, which I understand most people, including me, haven’t yet done!

Perhaps also because a significant part of Auroville’s population is ageing, there is now a need to engage in these topics in a philosophical, spiritual, and even experiential approach.

How is Auroville as a community dealing with death?

As Aurovilians, we can benefit from the extensive writings of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo about death, dying and immortality.

Auroville is reaching a level of maturity which can be seen from the developing work of the Farewell Group and the new farewell facility. The Farewell Group have been around for a long time and provides a great service. As far as I know, they are all volunteers who have other full time work in Auroville, but they go to great lengths in after-death care and help to create beautiful, meaningful funerals.

Could you share some more on the ideas you explored in the workshop and your own learning from it?

What interests me is not just the philosophical, spiritual or legal aspects of death but also to understand the beliefs and practices of different cultures. India is a particularly rich field for this type of research. The tradition of conscious preparation for death and dying is there in many ancient cultures. The Tibetans, for example, have a deep philosophy and detailed practices around death. The Dalai Lama is reported to have said that if you don’t practice or prepare towards your end once you’re 50, then all your other practices makes no sense in terms of your spiritual development.

I structure the format of the workshop to address the left and right side of the brain – the rational to talk about some things, discuss ideas, do some practical writing, and the experiential with creative activities, meditations, and silence.

Overall it is a good idea to let people know that imagery or music can also be used to explore such themes and not just rational thinking. At the closure, I got a sense from the participants that they needed some more time to talk and interact. The one-day workshop was in fact too short to facilitate this. So next month I will be adding a separate session dedicated to practical decision-making and plans.

What are some of your personal experiences that inspired you to take this idea forward and transform it into a meaningful exercise for the community?

I found that often people are able to transcend their differences when they are dying or a near one is dying – a lot of things that separate us tend to fade away and the essence or soul comes more to the surface. When I was a kid of 9 or 10, one of my early conscious thoughts about death was from a book written by a famous TV personality whose daughter had died in a school bus accident. What struck me the most was that the morning of the accident, they had argued about something silly and her daughter went off to school with them still being mad at each other. After the bus accident, she never saw her again and they never had the chance to reconcile. Like the line from Sting’s song: ‘Lest we forget how fragile we are’, it’s useful to remember that any of us can be gone in a moment, whether in an accident, a natural disaster or a terrorist attack.

Do you see the children as a part of such conversations?

In India people are more familiar with death and dying as it is very visible in our daily lives – the end of life is very visible in this society, and most kids have a natural awareness about it. So maybe the children who grew up here do have a natural sort of understanding of death, without verbalizing it. Unlike in my childhood, these days children are no longer kept away from death or hospitals to visit the dying and this can help them develop their own ideas and beliefs around it. But it would be interesting to find out how it differs from culture to culture.