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The Dreaded "D" Word: Downsizing! Are You Dreading Downsizing But Know its Next? Never mind the estimated $27 trillion to $46 trillion in assets transferring to millenials the Great Wealth Transfer. We are focusing on the "The Great Stuff Transfer" and "The Baby Boom Stuff Avalanche." You know you are getting to the time where you must move to a smaller place. Every time the thought crosses your mind, you feel overwhelmed, and so you keep putting it off. Or maybe you are the family caregiver who knows you must help your elder parent downsize and move. How to approach such a huge task? How to handle the emotions and logistics and huge size of the task? Let's dig in and figure out how to eat this elephant, one bite at a time! Presentation and discussion. Tuesday, April 7, 10am-11am PT/ 1pm-2pm ET Registration is through my email or DM me at rhyhalpern@gmail.com . Join me! It will be light and fun !

Big humungous enormous overwhelming grief and Little itty bitty moments of joy. That is how it seems to go at the beginning, right after a profound loss. And though the grief may never change in size or color or shape, slowly, over time, there will be more and bigger moments of joy, surrounding, cushioning, buoying, billowing the grief. It might be a hearty guffaw, a moment of delight, a splendid afternoon, an unexpected reprieve from the grief. I have been so moved on social media, following Megan Falley, recent widow of poet extraordinaire Andrea Gibson, who died in July 2025, as she moves with her grief. She leads and grief follows and then they switch. Megan is doing this grief dance in public, on tour with their film, "Come See Me in the Good Light." She says, "I am grieving in public. I am crying on stages. My pain is not hidden in shadows. It is spotlit. And so I am having the inverse experience of loss. Rather than people saying Andrea’s name less and less, they are saying it more and more." When she meets someone, they already know Andrea died. Megan doesn't have to tell them or answer uncomfortable questions or worry about what is appropriate to share. The door is wide open. Grief is welcomed in. Grief is flowing in each auditorium and community center and theatre Megan goes to. She is held by everyone. Her heart is wide open. She knows grief and she knows joy. They are becoming interwoven as she grieves openly. What would it be like if we could all grieve freely and openly? #deathdoula #andreagipson #meganfalley #griefandloss #deathanddying #cancer

Ahh, the wisdom of being a Wise Elder: "When you are old, devotions, rituals, icons, they fall away; you go straight to the heart."- 87 year old woman and widow. Going straight to the heart, coming straight from the heart. This is what matters. The closer we get to death, the more we know this truism. Everything else falls away. It doesn't matter what we did or how well we did it. All that matters is did we love fully and openly? Did we keep our hearts open? There have been so many times when my heart has been closed. It happens slowly or suddenly. The difference is now my intent is to stay open. I have noticed that people who are dying usually are very open hearted. They have so much love to give and receive. When there heart is closed, it is very tough to penetrate. I hope my heart is open when I am at my end days. Do you?

"Kiss the joy as it flies..." This is a line from a famous poem titled "Eternity" by William Blake. Someone in my Death Cafe today said she always hated that line in the poem because she wants to hold on to the joy. She wants to keep it close to her. She wants to hold it so tight that it can't leave her. But she also said she knows that isn't how joy works. That it is by nature ephemeral. That it is fleeting. That it can't be restrained or tied down or it will surely die. That by letting go and releasing it, there is more of it for everyone. Joy is free. Joy must feel free. Same with love.

"Whatever" upon waking. "Oh well" upon going to sleep. This is how the lovely writer and speaker extraordinaire Annie Lamott describes her daily mantras. But, as we know, she meant something more profound. She is certainly not cavalier about her day, her work, her life. Here's what I think she meant: We do the best we can. Every day. We plan. We show up. We consider. We try to be better. We choose. We move on. Sometimes it works out well. And sometimes our efforts are not successful. We are reminded to let go of attachment to the results. All we can do is our best. Some things are outside of our control. Things have an energy of their own. The point is to show up fully and give it our all, and then let go of attachment to the outcome. Its what the Buddhists call 'metta' or approximately, 'good will'. The mantra of 'whatever' and 'oh well' is code for we are doing our best, without aversion or attachment or suffering; with the intention to be kind to all beings, to spread good will to all beings, and to remember to include ourselves! What do you think?

“I would say that happiness is the sweetness of desiring what you have, fully aware of its fragility, its brevity and its limits. Happiness isn’t the absence of sadness, but the capacity to hold reality without needing it to be otherwise.” This quote by Stephen Grosz makes my heart happy. I have always felt that the word 'contentment' captures the sweetness of desiring what I have.  Likewise, I have always felt that the word 'acceptance' means to hold reality without needing it to be otherwise. The idea that these peaceful states are in fact happiness is new to me. And exciting. When people ask me how can I do the work of being with the dying, I think that perhaps I am comfortable with the uncomfortable.  But maybe its more that it brings me into that quiet, peaceful state of happiness.

What if rain drops had names? When they splashed down to the ground and broke apart, would you grieve them? Would you memorialize each drop by name? There are 8.3 billion people alive on the planet right now. Each of us was born, lived, cared for (however well or badly), and will die.  Each of has a name. Let us honor all life. Let us honor all death. We die because we were born. Every raindrop existed, exists and will exist again.

When you are in a conversation with someone, do you feel connected or like you are each giving a monologue?  Shortly before his untimely death, the great Irish poet, John O'Donahue, talked about beauty in general, and specifically about the beauty of listening in his interview with Krista Tippett, for her podcast, On Being, on Feb. 10, 2022.  He said that we often miss the beauty of a real conversation, when two people end of talking at each other without deep listening. He likened it to two people giving monologues. My ears perked up. I have felt this! I have tried to bridge the gap. I have gotten quieter. I have interrupted. Anything to feel connected. But sometimes I have lacked the skill. As a doula, I get to listen to people who are at the end of their lives, as well as their loved ones. As a conscious dying educator and facilitator of Death Cafes for five and a half years, I get to listen to people talk about all things death and dying, as well as grief and loss. I love listening.  "Listening creates a holy silence. When you listen generously to people, they can hear truth in themselves, often for the first time. And in the silence of listening, you can know yourself in everyone. Eventually you may be able to hear, in everyone and beyond everyone, the unseen singing softly to itself and to you." - Rachel Naomi Remen What more is there to say?

"The silence of this place is as real and solid as sound. More real, in fact." Written by Admiral Byrd in 1934, alone in a shack near the South Pole for five months. He received messages by radio from his friend President Roosevelt. Though close at times to death, he "felt more alive," he confesses, in his solitude, "than at any other time in my life." To feel alive because of silence, reminds me of the silence of death in a weird kind of way. Byrd's solitude, by definition, translated to silence. I love that he viewed silence as solid as sound. What is the Sound of Silence? You might have thought I was going to move onto the Simon & Garfunkel song! But no! The sound of silence makes beautiful sense to me. I think about it often when I feel a certain stillness from within. One of my first awarenesses of silence was brought to me in my teen years, by the artist/composer/musician, the late John Cage. John Cage's composition "4.33" proved silence was full of sound. Composed in 1952 for any instrument or combination of instruments; the score instructs performers not to play their instruments throughout the three movements. Cage performed it in the open lobby at CalArts, where I did my graduate work. The piece was first conceived in 1948 as a “Silent Prayer,” relating to the composer’s curiosity in Zen Buddhism and its emphasis on silent meditation. During the early 1950s. He began using I Ching, a Chinese practice based on flipping coins onto various charts, to determine aspects of works like Music of Changes (1951). He was known for cultivating a more abstract “compositional silence” by diminishing the composer’s control over the music. Another interesting influence on 4’33” was Cage’s 1951 visit to Harvard’s anechoic chamber, a space creating a near silent environment using surfaces designed to absorb all sounds. He was dismayed to find the quiet broken by the noise of his own nervous system and blood circulation. These factors suggest the piece is an invitation to meditate on the indeterminate ambience of any given environment, and the impossibility of “true” silence. In dismissing 4’33” as silent, and thus empty, audiences failed to tune in to these sounds. (source: https://lnkd.in/gMvS8-rF) When you get quiet within, do you hear sound? What sound are you aware of in a silent space? Does silence make you feel more alive? Listen to the sound of silence and let me know what you think.

It’s weird what makes me feel rich. I feel super rich right now. I just came back from the library with a stack of books I can't wait to read. I am a voracious reader. Now that I am semi-retired, I frequently consider spending less time working as an end of life doula and conscious dying educator and more time reading. I am in two book clubs and am considering a third. I love books. Too much. They make me feel rich. I won't even go into book stores anymore because I get into a frenzied state where I can't stand that I will never get to read all the books that exist. It is painful to me to not be able to absorb every stitch written in every book published. But actually I do have some standards. I don't really want to read every book. Its mostly literary fiction that I must have and some nonfiction. I am old enough now to allow myself permission to put down a book that I truly do not like. It feels indulgent to give up on a book, to ignore the author's attempts to express themselves on page, sometimes devoting years and decades to their effort. But sometimes, I must. I love the rush of being grabbed into the world the author created and being picked up in the whirlwind of the plot, to feel as if I understand what the main characters are feeling because I know them their motivations and desires so well, to be moved by the world they have invited me to witness. I consider it a holy ritual to order my books from my local library, and to know they will ping me when they arrive, and to walk that mile, or drive if I must, to walk through the doors, glowing with richness, find my books waiting for me in the stacks, check them out, and then hold them close to me with a big smile of gratitude glued to my face as I leave the cherished building. I feel so full and luxurious and basking in the promises of words and stories and themes and other lands. Surely, gifted writers are up there with the best of our species. I would be lost without them. Its almost as good as being an end of life doula, but nothing touches the honor of accompanying someone on that journey. Happy richly reading!

Death Doulas Get A Shout Out On The Pitt on Season 2 Episode 5! In the first season of The Pitt, we got to hear renown Dr. Ira Byock's 'four most important words at the end of life', which are: Thank you, I Love You, Please forgive me, I forgive you. Now, in the second season, we got to relish a scene with a death doula (with the red hair and braid in the photo) supporting a family in a medical crisis. She was depicted as a caring, compassionate, support person, who was there to help as needed. Although we are not medical licensed professionals, we can advocate for our clients. She encouraged more pain killers and took on finding the things her client would need after being released from the ER, a wheelchair, hospital bed, etc. These are products hospice typically provides, if there is a diagnosis of 6 months or less to live. Over the five years since I have been an end of life doula, I have seen the field explode. There are so many of us doing this work of companioning and honoring folks as they and their loved ones prepare for death and dying, with grace, compassion, and humility. The Pitt is known for doing alot of research with medical professionals to make the show as realistic and accurate as possible. They also include the human touches that make the show poignant, touching and real. It’s a big day for death doulas, and a big step for creating positive death experiences for all.

My mom refused morphine for two years! My sweet mom died almost eight years ago at age 94 of COPD. Last week was her birthday and she would be 103 years old. She was on hospice for 2.5 years. The hospice nurses and I spent 2 years trying to get her to use a small, tiny amount of morphine. "It will open up your airways and help you breathe more easily," they said. "Mom, just try it once!" I said, over and over again. She refused. She associated morphine with death. It was impossible to get her permission. I kept trying but without success. Finally, when she really was getting close to the end, about 6 months before she died, she agreed. She did a complete reversal, constantly remarking, "I can't believe how much easier it is to breathe! I have more energy too because I don't have to work so hard to breathe! Why didn't I try this sooner?" I nodded each time she said, so happy she felt the benefits. I even got to tease her a few times about being a stubborn mule. When she took to her deathbed in the last two weeks of her life, she was given larger doses of morphine for pain. She was getting more anxious and agitated at that time. It was harder for her to be soothed. Her bed sores were excruciating. She needed more comfort care in the form of drugs. I made sure the hospice team wasn't giving her so much that she was unconscious, until she seemed ready for that. The last 4 days of her life she was no longer conscious and I was at peace with that. We got to say goodbye and share words of love, and I felt complete. Happy birthday Mom! I miss you! I am happy you died just the way you wanted to!