Marianne as a Guest on Death and Dying in the Digital Age
How Do We talk about End of Life?
Being a guest on the Digital Legacy Podcast with Niki was truly an interesting experience. Given our work at Everyone Dies, I always enjoy the opportunity to discuss end-of-life topics with other people invested in increasing understanding and preparation about advance care planning. Talking about death isn’t easy, but Niki approached it with warmth, curiosity, and a genuine desire to educate. We explored the nuances between hospice and palliative care, why families struggle with end-of-life decisions, and how essential advance directives are in ensuring dignity in one’s final moments.
Sharing the Work Do We Do at Everyone Dies
We also discussed the work I do through Everyone Dies, my nonprofit and podcast, which serves as a resource for those navigating serious illness, death, and bereavement. I encourage everyone to take the time to prepare—have the hard conversations, document your wishes, and ensure your loved ones are not left making difficult decisions in uncertainty.
How to Catch the Interview
If you missed the episode, I highly recommend watching it on YouTube. It’s a conversation that can help reshape how we think about life’s final chapter. Thank you, Niki, for the opportunity to share this important message.
– Marianne Matzo, PhD, FAAN Everyone Dies Host
About Death and Dying in the Digital Age
Death and Dying in the Digital Age is a podcast that explores the uncharted territory of our online afterlife. Join host Niki Weiss each week as she navigates the complexities of end-of-life planning, from safeguarding your individual legacy to ensuring your loved ones can access your important digital assets.
As they dive into the four pillars of comprehensive death planning – Legal, Financial, Physical, and Digital – and you’ll see that by addressing these crucial aspects, you’ll gain peace of mind knowing that every facet of your life and legacy is accounted for. You can also get resources such as a digital inventory here and also check out the My Final Playbook app in the Apple Store.
“Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living and, above all, those who live without love” (spirit of school headmaster Albus Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2).
The greatest gift life offers many people is that someday, likely preferably sooner rather than later, they get to die. Perhaps worsening matters for them is when suicide is simply not an option (which applies to my situation), for whatever reason(s), meaning there’s little hope of receiving an early reprieve from their literal life sentence.
Many chronically and pharmaceutically untreatably depressed and/or anxiety-ridden people won’t miss this world when they finally pass away. They simply want/need their (at least seemingly) pointless immense corporeal suffering to end.
Therefore, being reincarnated an indefinite number of times would be considered Hell for many of them, as it would be for me — the repetition of mostly unhappiness. From my understanding, Buddhism [or is it Zen Buddhism?], which in large part is the positive belief in reincarnation, acknowledges that life generally is suffering or hardship interspersed with genuine happiness.
Ergo, to quote passages of a poem:
_____
I awoke from another very bad dream, a reincarnation nightmare / where having thankfully died I’m still bullied towards rebirth back into human form / despite my pleas I be allowed to rest in permanent peace. //
My bed wet from sweat, I futilely try to convince my own autistic brain / I want to live, the same traumatized dysthymic brain displacing me from the functional world. //
Within my nightmare a mob encircles me and insists that life’s ‘a blessing’, including mine. / I ask them for the ‘blessed’ purpose of my continuance. I insist upon a practical purpose. //
Each second that passes I should not have to repeat and suffer again. / I cry out ‘give me a real purpose and it’s not enough simply to live / nor that it’s a beautiful sunny day with colorful fragrant flowers!’ //
I explain to them that I’m tormented hourly by my desire for both contentedness and emotional, material and creative gain / that are unattainable yet ultimately matter naught. My own mind brutalizes me like it has / a sadistic mind of its own. I must have a progressive reason for this harsh endurance! //
Bewildered they warn that one day on my death bed I’ll regret my ingratitude / and that I’m about to lose my life. // I counter that I cannot mourn the loss of something I never really had / so I’m unlikely to dread parting from it. //
Frustrated they say that moments from death I’ll clamor and claw for life / like a bridge-jumper instinctively flailing his limbs as though to grasp at something / anything that may delay his imminent thrust into the eternal abyss. // How can I in good conscience morosely hate my life / while many who love theirs lose it so soon? they ask. //
Angry I reply that people bewail the ‘unfair’ untimely deaths of the young who’ve received early reprieve / from their life sentence, people who must remain behind corporeally confined / yet do their utmost to complete their entire life sentence—even more, if they could! //
The vexed mob then curse me with envy for rejecting what they’d kill for—continued life through unending rebirth. // ‘Then why don’t you just kill yourself?’ they yell, to which I retort ‘I would if I could. // My life sentence is made all the more oppressive by my inability to take my own life.’ //
‘Then we’ll do it for you!’ As their circle closes on me, I awaken. //
Could there be people who immensely suffer yet convince themselves they sincerely want to live when in fact / they don’t want to die, so greatly they fear Death’s unknown? // No one should ever have to repeat and suffer again a single second that passes. //
Nay, I will engage and embrace the dying of my blight!
.
.
[NOTE: By definition, I’m not suicidal.]