Living Fully, Dying Well: Reflecting on Death to Find Your Life's Meaning

Living Fully, Dying Well: Reflecting on Death to Find Your Life's Meaning by Edward W. Bastian. hardcover edition. ISBN: 0600835134781.

“How can you take the fear of death and turn it into something profound, something positive? What is the alchemy that allows someone who is in a metaphorical desert to turn around and see a flower?”—Tina L. Staley “Death—the last sleep? No, it is the final awakening.”—Sir Walter Scott Most of us try to avoid thinking about death until the moment we come face-to-face with it. But when we have the courage to accept our inevitable mortality—and even to contemplate it actively, as a spiritual practice—we open the door to living fully, joyfully, and in complete presence. Living Fully, Dying Well is an investigation into the challenge each of us faces—to embrace all of life, from the beginning to the end. When death approaches, many of us undergo a profound transformation—we let go of old distractions and focus with new clarity on what gives our life meaning. Yet we can invite these profound “deathbed revelations” at any point in our lives by engaging in an honest inquiry into our own mortality. Living Fully, Dying Well provides a doorway to begin your own exploration of the mysteries of death—from the cultural myths about dying, to the personal fears we all share, to the question of what becomes of us beyond this life. Living Fully, Dying Well unfolds as a dialogue between spiritual leaders and medical healers, each of whom brings their own unique perspective to the universal human experience of death. These luminaries offer their stories, their insights, and their most valuable practices, all to transform death from a source of fear to an opportunity to reveal the true richness of your life. Living Fully, Dying Well has received the following awards: 2010 Gold Independent Publishers Award (IPPY)—Aging/Death & Dying 2010 Gold Nautilus Award—Grieving/Death & Dying 2010 Gold Living Now Award—Grieving/Death & Dying