about to live-chat with dr. BJ miller, & a lil' excerpt of his book for you {patrons-only} (Patreon)

{patrons-only}

hey my loves. comin' in hot...TL;DR, live cast is about to start! head over: https://www.crowdcast.io/e/aoae-ep3. i'm in the kitchen makin' tea and getting ready.

......

longer story....here's some READING, below... dr BJ miller, my last podcast guest and palliative care/death expert, sent us a little important chunk of his new book, "a beginner's guide to the end" below, as promised. it's about fear, and death. 

yeah.

and...i'm going to be LIVE online with dr. Bj miller in about 15 minutes....7 pm NYC time, noon aotearoa-time. its PATRON ONLY. it will be archived and u0;loaded for those of you who miss it, don't worry.

i just checked the crowdcast and there's already a bunch of good questions in the Q&A, including this one from kat drew:

"New Zealand is having a referendum on euthanasia and I would love to hear you have a discussion on this. I'm really undecided despite so much researching. I think people deserve to have the choice of assisted suicide, but am concerned about the pressure people may feel to do so when the choice is available....."

oof. i can't wait to hear him talk about that. i also have feelings.

exact time: october 14th at 7pm ET

click the link and log on, start asking!: 

https://www.crowdcast.io/e/aoae-ep3

we'll be chatting live for about an hour and change...thinking, feeling, answering your questions. again, barring any unforeseen technical issues, as soon as our live broadcast ends an archived recording will go up that you can watch it at any time. (the link to tune in live is the same link to use to watch the recording.)

.......

some words from BJ:

hi folks! some notes on what i’m doing now:

i’m getting back to direct service. i have done enough book touring and talking, and, with covid, have happily found my way back to full frontal direct palliative care.  this time, in a new way for the times.  just starting mettlehealth.com as the first online palliative care service that anyone can use, anytime they wish.  am sidestepping the medical industry to start — too much baggage and rigamarole to gum up the works, and people need access now — so there’s no need for a doctors referral.  we’re building it now, and we’re also seeing clients at the same time…. (lots to discuss here on any of these details, including its relationship to the healthcare system and the implied indictment of that system).

we also have quietly started a non-profit site, the center for dying and living.  this is place to gather stories about living with illness or disability or trauma, and/or caring for someone who is.  this one’s on a much slower train, but someday it wats to be a great big library of information and experiences.

meantime, am doing what i can to keep speaking and provoking interest in the subjects of suffering, healthcare, loss, illness, disability….. all in an effort to make sure we humans get to know what we actually already know and gain the support we deserve, so we can hurt no more than we have to and delight whenever possible…..

here's a link to the BOOK: 

"A Beginner's Guide to the End - Practical Advice for Living Life and Facing Death":
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/A-Beginners-Guide-to-the-End/BJ-Miller/9781501157165 

and

here's the BJ/book thread on the patron book club.....
https://forum.theshadowbox.net/t/episode-3-discuss-bj-millers-a-beginners-guide-to-the-end-here/5835

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, here's an little excerpt from BJ Miller's book that he graciously sent along for patrons. read and learn:

Fear

FEAR OF DEATH (MORTAL FEAR) IS THE MOTHER OF ALL FEARS. Psychologists and philosophers call it angst or dread; clinicians are beginning to adopt the catch-all phrase “existential distress.” Whatever you call it, mortal fear is in a class by itself because its source is inside us. It’s not easy to pin down and deal with in the same way you would a phobia of some external threat like snakes or heights. Unlike snakes or heights, the object of this fear is inevitable: death is a little time bomb planted inside us, but none of us gets to know when, precisely, it will go off. As the Buddhist teacher Pema Chödrön puts it, “Fear is a natural response to coming closer to the truth.”

Understanding Fear

THERE’S DYING, AND THEN THERE’S DEATH. THE FIRST IS MORE straightforward. Fear of dying comes mostly from what we imagine dying will be like. The good news here is that a frightened imagination is almost always overly pessimistic. From what I’ve seen at many bedsides, and heard from countless others, dying is very often peaceful. (Harder for those witnessing it than for the person actually doing it.) Then there’s the fear of death, of being dead. Seneca, the revered Roman thinker, wrote two thousand years ago, “We mortals are . . . lighted and extinguished; the period of suffering comes in between, but on either side there is deep peace . . . we go astray in thinking that death only follows, when in reality it has both preceded us and will in turn follow us.” All of the major religions have some tradition and language to remind us of life’s transience. “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return,” goes the liturgy on Ash Wednesday, the holy day of repentance in the Christian tradition. By making death a homecoming, philosophers and prophets have attempted to help us keep our lives in perspective and to remind us that our decisions matter because our time is not unlimited.

Coming to terms with death means coming to terms with time—and not just with the fact that the future is suddenly constricted. Yes, there is that fear of missing out, but there is also a fear associated with looking back in time. That fear has a name: regret, and what a gnarly beast it can be. You begin to realize the impossibility of correcting the past, just as you realize you won’t get to achieve every one of your dreams. One way or another, mortal fear becomes connected to the fear of not living your life while you have it. This gets at both the problem and the solution: all our new limitations, both forward and backward, can bring into focus what is still possible.

“Treating” Fear

MODERN MEDICINE TENDS TO TREAT FEAR AS DEPRESSION OR “generalized anxiety disorder” and send you home with a prescription for Prozac or Valium. But mortal fear is different: it has nothing to do with mental illness and is a vital force that shouldn’t simply be snuffed out. There is important stuff wrapped up in this fear; namely, the search for meaning, one of the greatest compulsions of all. Who am I? What am I doing? Is there a higher purpose to all this? Does my life mean anything? Why me? These kinds of big questions, and the feelings lurking around them, signal a time for investigation. Instead of running away, we’d encourage you to get closer.

amen.

see you in a sec. again, it'll be archived for those of you asleep or busy.

x

a

------THE NEVER-ENDING AS ALWAYS---------

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