The Art of Manliness - #500： Let's Talk About Death Over Dinner

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast today is actually

00:00:12.180 the 500th episode of the aom podcast which is a cool milestone thanks to everyone who's been with

00:00:17.860 us from the beginning for a long time now or if you just started listening thank you for joining

00:00:21.960 us and if you just started you've got 500 episodes you could check out our podcast archives and you

00:00:26.900 can check that out at art of manliness.com slash podcast so thanks a lot it's been a fun ride and

00:00:31.560 here's to 500 more and let's get down to today's show when you invite people over for dinner party

00:00:36.540 you likely think of some delightful conversation topics to bring up to keep your guests engaged

00:00:40.840 my guest today argues that one of those topics should be death his name is michael heb and he's

00:00:45.340 the founder of death over dinner an organization that encourages folks to have dinner parties to

00:00:49.420 talk about death from the philosophical aspects to practical matters like wills and funeral planning

00:00:53.800 today on the show we discuss why you should invite friends and family to your house to talk

00:00:57.220 death over a plate of lasagna we begin our conversation discussing the downsides of not

00:01:01.000 talking about death and how ill-prepared americans are for death both emotionally and financially also

00:01:05.460 practically michael then shares the best ways to invite people to a death over dinner party and

00:01:09.600 then we dig into questions you can use to get people talking about death in terms of both the

00:01:13.780 practical and the philosophical and true story after i recorded this episode i had dinner with some

00:01:18.520 friends and we discussed death and estate planning over some pizza pie it was a big success

00:01:22.980 after the show's over check out the show notes at aom.is slash death over dinner michael joins me now

00:01:28.060 via clearcast.io all right michael heb welcome to the show thanks for having me so you wrote a book

00:01:44.320 and you're the founder of a thing called let's talk about death over dinner so how do you come

00:01:50.140 with this idea to host dinner parties where the topic of conversation is death it's kind of a long

00:01:56.700 story so i'm glad we've got a little bit of time like it started actually with my interest in

00:02:05.020 architecture which may seem like a bit of a departure to how we get to conversation about

00:02:10.620 death over the dinner table but i went to architecture school was just about to graduate and

00:02:17.420 ended up starting an architecture firm as you sometimes do right instead of going the standard

00:02:25.000 process of finishing your degree putting all of your time in getting your stamp and becoming an

00:02:31.960 official architect i decided to drop out of school and with another designer start a project called

00:02:40.000 the city repair project and an architecture firm called communitexture and long story short what

00:02:47.120 we started doing was look at the city it was portland oregon where we were living and we decided that we

00:02:54.040 wanted to repair the city in the way that we saw fit not necessarily the way that city management and

00:03:00.720 the bureaucracy thought it should be done and so we started doing things like building buildings without

00:03:07.860 permits but also creating large community interventions that in many ways broke the law and

00:03:16.680 that one kind of renowned intervention was to turn a residential intersection in the selwood

00:03:26.200 neighborhood neighborhood in portland into a piazza into a public square or traditional gathering place

00:03:32.920 and so we convinced all of the neighbors that lived in that neighborhood to come together and paint a

00:03:39.480 500 foot anasazi symbol of life in the middle of the asphalt on an intersection in a residential

00:03:46.800 neighborhood with the idea that we would essentially lay down this design this scheme and bring everyone

00:03:55.320 together so that we could create the type of space that we felt like we needed in order to connect with

00:04:00.900 each other i think our modern cities do a very good job of disconnecting us you know are the people

00:04:07.040 that we live around the people that we work with where we shop where we eat all of these things have

00:04:12.220 been pretty well separated in modern life and so we wanted to you know address that and start to create

00:04:19.900 really powerful gathering spaces for people the city got really pissed off as you might be able to imagine

00:04:25.240 and they didn't know who to blame necessarily because there had been about a hundred neighbors that came

00:04:30.580 together and had had created this action this massive artwork almost like a piece like a banksy piece or

00:04:39.720 something on the city street ultimately the mayor got really excited about the project and was kind of

00:04:47.140 admonished the bureaucrats and said this is doing exactly what we want what i've asked you to do it's

00:04:53.240 slowing down traffic it's bringing community together the cost of it was you know several buckets of

00:04:58.760 paint yes they broke the law but they're going to probably cost the city less because they'll be

00:05:04.660 relying on each other and communicating and reducing the cost of services and so you know here i was like

00:05:11.260 21 and this was one of our first projects we were also getting paid gigs to design houses and public

00:05:18.800 squares but the the intersection repair went from being just a single installation to now there's

00:05:25.820 over 15 000 all over the world become a kind of you know urban design city planning archetype and it was

00:05:34.800 really just you know it was me and my partner mark with this crazy idea and so how that relates to

00:05:42.920 having dinners and talking about death is from that early i guess from my early career as a designer

00:05:50.840 i saw very clearly that people are deeply yearning for meaning in their lives that we live in a culture

00:05:58.280 that doesn't provide a lot of opportunity to gather in meaningful ways and that there's a deep desire

00:06:06.140 and a deficit almost like a bankruptcy around meaning and that people will do extraordinary

00:06:11.520 things in order to connect so i took that early experience and continued thinking like a designer

00:06:19.900 and realized that the dinner table is the ultimate gathering place it always has been that's actually

00:06:25.940 where we became human and if and we've forgotten how to eat together we've forgotten how to use these

00:06:32.140 dinner tables that sit in most of our houses and so i combine this idea with crossing a boundary breaking

00:06:40.380 a law breaking a taboo like talking about death and realizing that we have a great need for

00:06:46.140 meaningful gathering at the dinner table after 20 years of using the dinner table and understanding it

00:06:52.360 i'm in a bunch of really kind of crazy you know sometimes messed up sometimes really amazing ways

00:06:59.760 i learned enough to be able to ask people come to the table and talk about what was arguably the

00:07:05.580 most difficult thing to discuss right and it's also one of the most important things to discuss

00:07:10.560 because it's a fact like i think you said in the book like we're we are all children of death

00:07:15.260 right like we will all die one day but we don't talk about it and you begin the book talking about

00:07:20.960 there are some like actual like practical consequences not just existential consequences we will talk about

00:07:28.100 that but that's an important part but it's also like just brass tacks consequences of not talking

00:07:32.280 about death what are some of those consequences yeah well the specific inspiration for this movement

00:07:39.840 death over dinner and then the book let's talk about death was a response to one of those very

00:07:45.500 practical issues that we face and it you know it was seven years ago when i started the project

00:07:53.960 and it it was one of those it wasn't a eureka moment but it was one of those moments where you

00:07:58.640 have a conversation with someone and you know that your life will be forever changed from that moment

00:08:04.340 forward and you know you're lucky if you have one of those experiences you're incredibly lucky if you

00:08:10.980 have many i've had many of those experiences where i i'm literally watching my life change as i'm having

00:08:17.560 the experience knowing this and the impact all of my future days and so i'm on this train between

00:08:24.740 seattle and portland and i sit down in the dining car and what i usually do in a dining car is in the

00:08:32.520 train or in any of these you know different transits transportation modes that we use is i isolate

00:08:40.940 myself right i find the chair where i can sit by myself and i grab a seat put on headphones possibly

00:08:47.200 but for whatever reason that day i decided i think maybe it was a crowded dining car and there was

00:08:52.560 only one seat available with two other people at the table and they both ended up being these doctors

00:08:57.480 and they both left the you know kind of conventional medicine practices that they had to you know go on

00:09:05.460 one of them was on a walkabout and just gotten back from haiti and the other one didn't know what

00:09:10.920 they were going to do what they weren't going to do allopathic medicine and so we started talking and

00:09:16.960 you know it's like so you had left the medical world and why have two random doctors decided to

00:09:24.060 leave our medical system and of course they're like well it's broken so like you i like to ask questions

00:09:30.620 and i said you know why what is the most broken thing in our medical system and their answer was

00:09:37.040 the same even though they didn't know each other and they both literally at the same time say how we

00:09:43.080 die and for me that was a striking response because seven years ago there wasn't front page news about

00:09:52.120 end-of-life care advanced care palliative care hospice these things weren't even talked about in

00:09:58.820 the d e or f sections of our newspapers very often there's been a total sea change and so you know and so

00:10:05.680 inquired further and the statistic that came out of that conversation that stopped me cold was that

00:10:11.860 75 and now i think it's actually in some cases 80 percent depending upon how you figure the statistics

00:10:18.940 but essentially 75 percent of us want to die at home in in the united states and 20 only 25 percent of us do

00:10:26.740 and so if you do the quick math on that that's half of america not getting what it wants at you know at

00:10:34.260 the end not having access to or not deciding to or for some reason not getting their wishes granted

00:10:41.360 at the end of their life and you know we live in a country that prides itself on rugged individualism

00:10:48.860 and the freedom of choice and a number a list of freedoms and the fact that we're not getting what we want

00:10:56.000 for the one thing that we all have in common for me was incredibly striking and i immediately saw that

00:11:02.040 you know a conversation as i delved a little bit deeper with these doctors to understand that because

00:11:09.240 we're not talking about death because we're not talking about our wishes they're not becoming they're

00:11:14.600 not getting fulfilled and and that's and at that point i asked them so what if i get what if i get

00:11:19.960 the whole country to talk about death you know my brother likes to tell me it's always an opera with me so

00:11:24.500 it's not like well let's start small it's like how do we take on this issue at a global scale

00:11:32.240 the first national and then global and so i said i'm going to start this project let's have dinner and

00:11:37.860 talk about death and they're like great done we support you and i haven't seen those two doctors

00:11:43.960 since but the the reality was we hit a nerve this project and even though when we first started

00:11:50.600 people thought that we were insane combining these two things in the last five years since it launched

00:11:57.360 by conservative count there's over a million people that have sat down and had this two to three hour

00:12:02.920 experience and we've done that for literally no funding other than a small indiegogo so i mean you

00:12:09.840 said okay 75 percent of americans want to die at home but only 25 percent do so it sounds like you

00:12:15.420 have to have a plan and a very proactive plan so like if you don't have a plan what's the default

00:12:21.000 in the medical field like why why do these guys think the way we die is broken is there a default

00:12:25.760 that goes on there that causes people to end up dying in the hospital where they don't want to be

00:12:30.480 yeah so it's it takes a great deal of strength and tenacity to stand up to a doctor or in an icu situation

00:12:43.440 or even sometimes to get somebody into hospice care and there is a a default which is keep somebody

00:12:51.100 alive at all costs treat every malady as it arises even if it's not going to prolong life or prolong

00:12:58.620 a quality of life so that's where our medical system is set at default and it's not you know some

00:13:04.300 people say it's because there's incredible greed in the system and certainly there's probably some of

00:13:09.100 that there's also the hippocratic oath and there's also just the the way that our medical system is

00:13:14.700 set up is to focus on beating curing getting people back to some level of you know of stasis or some

00:13:24.460 level of well-being and so if you decide that you want to take a loved one or if you are in that

00:13:31.780 situation and you want to actually stop fighting or die not in a hospital room surrounded by an array

00:13:40.680 of machines and strangers it is difficult to stand up and say this is what i want especially when people

00:13:48.640 aren't willing to talk about the fact that the end is near there's not a conversation of about reckoning

00:13:54.940 like it's coming the likelihood of of of me getting out of here alive is low how do i want my final

00:14:04.120 days to be how do i want my final moments to be you have individuals family members doctors nurses

00:14:12.080 administrators all with a very low level of comfort and a low level of literacy around this conversation

00:14:20.120 and so the conversations don't happen hardly at all and when they do happen when people actually

00:14:27.000 talk about so as far as the practical quality of this conversation it's a little bit of a perfect

00:14:33.680 perfect storm as you said there's existential there's spiritual reasons there's peace of mind reasons there's

00:14:40.720 a lot of different elements to why we'd want to have this conversation why we'd want to face our

00:14:45.760 mortality but the very practical ones come down to the fact that you you want to let your family know

00:14:53.980 what you want at the end how you want to be treated where you want to be what you know what is the

00:15:01.380 feeling that you want in the room like what kind of music do you want playing do you want to have

00:15:07.660 yourself strapped to a bunch of machines do you want to fight at all costs if you don't tell them

00:15:13.340 that they don't know how to advocate for you to make sure it happens and if you don't tell them

00:15:18.700 what you want to have happen to your body or your things or your possessions a couple different things

00:15:24.760 happen so one if we don't have wills and obviously we never know when we're going to die

00:15:30.520 i have plenty of friends that have lost loved ones and spouses in the middle of their life and they

00:15:35.860 weren't prepared and my friend chanel reynolds started this incredible project get your shit together 0.76

00:15:41.040 because she lost her husband to a motorcycle accident and she didn't know where the life 0.94

00:15:46.700 insurance papers were the bank account information was and she literally lost a whole year of her life

00:15:51.940 just in logistics so knowing what happens to our stuff having our family know that you're doing

00:16:00.460 them a great service the amount of litigation that happens around family law and trust law and when

00:16:07.200 people die and wills it's just it's criminal and it's it's not necessary it's avoidable the other

00:16:14.000 thing that i think is arguably more important than avoiding the litigious nature of of someone dying 0.83

00:16:20.440 is that if we don't know what our loved ones want or we haven't told our loved ones what we want

00:16:27.740 people don't know how to honor us they don't know if we don't they don't know exactly that we want

00:16:33.220 to be cremated and what we want to have happen to our remains if we have a specific idea about that

00:16:38.480 it's not going to happen but it also doesn't allow that person who's grieving us to have a clear

00:16:46.040 grieving process because when our wishes are spoken and honored it's been proven in studies

00:16:52.560 grieving process is actually shorter so there's and we can do practical layers like if you make

00:17:02.240 decisions early about your wishes and advanced care and have a living will and some people go and

00:17:08.880 negotiate a funeral you know plot and you know a coffin and all of these things there's money to

00:17:17.160 be safe there and you know there's it's also the number one cause of bankruptcy end-of-life cost in

00:17:22.460 the united states so again we have this perfect storm of the practical and and the existential yeah the uh

00:17:29.980 the statistic about the the number one cause of bankruptcy being end-of-death or end-of-life

00:17:34.540 costs like i worked at the trustee's office and that's we saw a lot of that it was really sad

00:17:39.340 right because these people they didn't their their loved one didn't have a plan so they just tried to

00:17:43.340 extend life as long as they could when they finally died they didn't have a plan on what to do so they

00:17:48.060 ended up spending a lot more probably than maybe the person wanted on a funeral because they don't

00:17:52.840 know it was just yeah it was really tough to see that and we don't want to make all those decisions

00:17:56.700 when we're grieving or we're in crisis right i mean that's the the thing that we we really want

00:18:05.760 to be able to be as present as possible for our loved ones when they're at the end or when they're

00:18:10.600 in the icu and if we're having to think about these logistical details one we're going to make

00:18:17.120 you know we don't make good decisions when we're flooded when we're in fight or flight you know that's

00:18:23.000 our reptilian brain it's not coming from our heart and so the decisions they're not very wise

00:18:28.840 and they definitely don't always resonate with with what we ultimately would want or the person

00:18:33.780 that we're trying to make decisions for would want okay so those there's some big practical

00:18:37.940 consequences of not talking about death and i think we'll get into the existential stuff here in

00:18:42.560 a bit so let's let's talk about okay say someone's listening to this like that sounds kind of

00:18:46.040 interesting to have you know death over dinner like how do you how do you invite someone do you just be

00:18:50.420 like hey we're gonna have chicken a la keen and we're gonna talk about death you want to come

00:18:54.240 like how does that work well one of the reasons why we created death over dinner is so that you would

00:19:01.320 have a blameable third party right we decided that if you had an incredible toolkit almost like a board

00:19:09.500 game that made it very clear how you would host and run and execute or be at make happen an experience

00:19:19.320 like this you don't want to leave a lot to guesswork right because people are many people are already

00:19:24.440 just naturally stressed out or triggered or uncomfortable with this conversation which really

00:19:30.240 is not i mean there's some of it that's just the nature of the conversation and so much of it is

00:19:35.900 cultural we haven't primed people for or created opportunities or permission for people to have these

00:19:43.040 conversations so it's it's awkward and uncomfortable for a lot of people so the idea with death over

00:19:49.520 dinner was to make it as simple as possible to make it as simple as the simplest board game

00:19:54.140 it's almost like the opposite of cards against humanity right and you like you do and say

00:20:00.180 extraordinary things and when you play cards against humanity that you wouldn't do or say in other

00:20:06.700 situations right we could be completely inappropriate and so with death over dinner it's like let's

00:20:13.300 create that level of clarity for people so they can be like don't blame me don't look at me i hosted

00:20:19.940 you to this thing you know i invited you but it's a real thing like there's been a million people that

00:20:24.080 have done it and the new york times and usa today and all of these people have written about it and

00:20:28.480 you know it's a movement so i was very knowledge very clear in my thinking that we needed to have

00:20:35.780 the media behind us this needed to be a project that was legible in the mainstream so that some

00:20:42.520 when someone did invite their loved ones who were like you know what in the hell are you talking about

00:20:47.760 they had some ammo i could be like well look over here like tim ferris has death dinners you know

00:20:55.100 ariana huffington has death dinners whoever you you know you can pick somebody that you your family 0.91

00:21:01.200 member idolizes and i can help you find out if they've had a death dinner but nonetheless that

00:21:07.480 that is just one element of of it being you know out in the mainstream having it be helpful how you

00:21:13.980 actually invite somebody is say that you're you found that this movement was really seemed really

00:21:20.340 interesting or seems really powerful and that the people that you're inviting are the people that you

00:21:25.340 really want to have this conversation with because they're the people that you care about most

00:21:30.040 sometimes it's better to start with friends and sometimes you care about your friends more than

00:21:34.700 either your family sometimes your friends are going to be more likely to be the people making

00:21:38.760 decisions for you or more closer to you than at the end than your family but the the thing about

00:21:45.240 inviting people is one you never surprise people it's never come over for you know chili or pizza

00:21:54.940 and surprise we're gonna have this death dinner it's okay it's a national movement but you know

00:22:01.100 that doesn't work so you give people the opportunity to select into an experience like this a dinner is

00:22:07.640 not necessarily the best place for all people to have this conversation and so i mean the book that i

00:22:14.420 wrote is much more about having the conversation anywhere and having access to the prompts and the

00:22:19.540 conversational the conversation starters and the questions that you can ask people and answer yourself

00:22:24.600 anywhere whether you're doing it via email skype walking in the woods drinking beers it's a group of

00:22:31.980 people etc so i would say invite people thoughtfully and without the you know without an expected outcome

00:22:41.040 gotcha and then be up front like you don't yeah you said don't don't spring it on them like uh

00:22:45.240 you know people do with mlms like hey let's go have lunch do you want to enjoy my mlm like you know

00:22:50.640 hey let's have dinner we're gonna talk about death when you're here don't do that don't do that it's a good

00:22:56.400 way you wouldn't you wouldn't want somebody to do that to you right you know exactly we're gonna take

00:23:00.640 a quick break for your word from our sponsors and now back to the show all right so uh you you invite

00:23:06.880 the person and and say they say yes and some people are gonna say no because there's like i'm not ready

00:23:10.940 for that or just i'm not comfortable that that's okay like don't you don't have to make it weird

00:23:14.640 nope um you get the people there who want to be there food's on the table like how do you kick

00:23:20.460 off the conversation about death while you're munching on roasted lamb or whatever right well

00:23:26.400 a note about food people are like what kind what do i cook for a death dinner do i do themed and it's

00:23:31.480 like well what what you cook should be something that doesn't stress you out and this goes for any

00:23:38.180 dinner party you're hosting or any kind of actual gathering you're hosting if you're the host and you're

00:23:43.760 stressed out your guests are on some level also on alert they're you know we're social creatures we

00:23:50.660 look to the people that are hosting an experience to understand what kind of experience that is and

00:23:56.820 how the you know how we're meant to be in that experience and so a lot of people will cook elaborate

00:24:02.500 dinners and and they're not necessarily good at cooking elaborate dinners without being stressed out

00:24:08.460 and don't do it order some takeout if if that's what it if that's what it takes if that's what your

00:24:13.320 comfort level is so we can really focus on the people that are there not on perfecting your

00:24:18.460 chicken alla king as you mentioned so the you've got them there the beauty of the website and the

00:24:25.760 toolkit you get from the websites the website leads you through a couple questions it's kind of like

00:24:30.240 choose your own adventure it's the only thing to do on the website is answer a couple questions and

00:24:35.180 then get a toolkit a script for your evening and the questions ask you you know who's coming and that's

00:24:41.300 just kind of a engagement question doesn't affect any of the content and then the second question

00:24:47.280 is pretty key it's what's your intention for having the dinner so perhaps you know you have found out or

00:24:56.140 somebody in your life has found out that they have a terminal diagnosis anybody who's struggling with

00:25:01.280 a serious terminal diagnosis death is in some way in the room they're thinking about it they might not

00:25:06.740 be talking to you about it but it's it's a presence right and some people when they are struggling with

00:25:13.320 a terminal diagnosis really want an opportunity to chat with their community to talk to their

00:25:17.660 community openly so that'd be kind of an extreme situation where somebody wanted to have one of

00:25:22.760 these dinners maybe you're a young family that just wants to get this planning done maybe your

00:25:27.440 parents are getting a little bit older and you want to have the conversation with them or you're

00:25:31.740 you're you know you're getting older and you want to have the conversation with your kids

00:25:35.980 your grown you know adult kids or you think it's a philosophically interesting conversation you want

00:25:42.440 to delve into it with your friends so when you select those are all the intentions are listed out

00:25:48.780 and when you select them what it does is then create a customized script and it starts with a very

00:25:56.500 simple ritual I guess you could call it where you acknowledge somebody who's no longer with us

00:26:01.600 somebody who's died in your life and this can be somebody you knew well or some if you're younger

00:26:06.840 and you haven't had many losses it might be somebody that you idolized or looked up to or an animal

00:26:13.100 you know it could be you know death has many different shades so you acknowledge that person

00:26:18.420 say something you the impact they had on your life and then there will be three or four questions

00:26:24.640 that have been selected based upon your intention things like what song would you have you know

00:26:30.000 performed at your funeral and who would sing it what would you what do you want your last meal to be

00:26:34.300 so those are kind of the more icebreaker conversation prompts that don't necessarily read as

00:26:42.080 we're having a death conversation they're a little bit more accepted in the in in our in our culture

00:26:48.380 and then there's the more of deep end of the pool conversations as people warm up and those are

00:26:56.460 questions like you have 30 days left to live you just found out that you're only going to be here

00:27:01.940 for another month how do you feel what are you going to spend your next 30 days doing what is your last

00:27:07.200 hour like your last day like who's around you how do you feel close to the end and you learn a lot

00:27:12.880 about yourself when you when you answer that question you know a lot of these the beauty of these

00:27:19.000 dinners and the reason why I've been able to host so many personally is because

00:27:22.120 they're never they never get dull because people are always surprising themselves you hear people say

00:27:28.460 things that they've never said out loud or maybe they've never even thought or put together as a

00:27:33.760 combination of ideas and so people learn what it is they value most and you watch watching somebody

00:27:41.060 surprise and educate themselves about themselves is pretty extraordinary to watch it's maybe one of the

00:27:50.040 the most beautiful things and then spouses and partners and siblings and parents and kids also learn

00:27:57.960 about each other and old friends learn things that they never knew about each other from these

00:28:02.900 questions and that's I mean that kind of discovery or new information is what fuels intimacy intimacy in a

00:28:11.700 friendship intimacy in a love relationship intimacy in a parent-child relationship that kind of deep

00:28:19.360 human connection happens at every one of these dinners I've ever been at and everyone I've ever

00:28:24.760 heard somebody talk about yeah I always think that's interesting to learn about life you often have to talk

00:28:29.320 about death like that's some of the most profound insights about life is whenever you have that

00:28:33.200 conversation yeah I mean it's the great mirror right it is what defines this thing called life if we

00:28:39.140 didn't have death it would just be existence right life is by its very nature you know this uh this

00:28:47.580 temporary this finite thing and it's there's been incredible studies done where you know again this

00:28:55.680 is this death phobic culture these don't become front page news on these studies but it was at

00:29:01.500 Princeton I believe did a study where they determined that facing death and talking about death increased

00:29:09.140 your sense of humor and also made you funnier which is pretty phenomenal to see also there's a remarkable

00:29:16.560 psychologist psychologist clinical psychologist working in New York Jordana Jacobs and she's done

00:29:22.060 the first of a series of studies to see how facing our mortality and embracing the fact that we do die

00:29:30.740 leads to more intimacy and more connection and in our in our long-term relationships which is what

00:29:37.280 people want in their long-term relationships and you know and they do a lot of extraordinary things to

00:29:43.440 try to increase intimacy to increase the fire and and maintain it and sustain it and it's like

00:29:50.200 what you could also just talk about death maybe it translates into the bedroom so let's talk about

00:29:58.900 some of these prompts these questions that you have in your toolkit like the one of them is like why

00:30:03.380 don't we talk about death when you've brought that question up at your dinners like what are some of

00:30:08.120 the answers you've gotten over the years yeah I mean it's a it's a great question and it's funny it's

00:30:14.660 one of the questions that is a little bit more of a philosophical nature and I I'm very careful when

00:30:21.640 I when when we ask questions that don't result in I statements so it's maybe the only question in the

00:30:30.680 book and that we use in a dinner that doesn't directly have somebody talk about you know their

00:30:36.300 own experience it it's a place where people will talk about our culture and which is great to talk

00:30:42.880 about our culture death dinners are designed around people talking about their own experience

00:30:47.580 because there are no experts in death and you're the only person who's an expert in how you feel about

00:30:52.780 your own mortality but as far as why we don't talk I've learned a lot about from doctors and nurses

00:31:00.180 about how we've medicalized death in the same way that we medicalized birth it's very there's a lot

00:31:05.860 of parallels not surprisingly between the culture and the machine and the business of being born in

00:31:12.780 the and that of dying and we've taken birth in many ways from a very community family experience and

00:31:21.540 we've made it a very medical experience often at great cost to individuals and and there's been some

00:31:27.760 great improvements as well and a lot of people a lot of children that wouldn't be on this planet

00:31:33.800 and humans that wouldn't be on this planet without the medical medicalization of birth but we've done

00:31:39.620 it very effectively with death as well we've taken from a community act it was we're not we don't

00:31:45.500 encounter bodies anymore that are we don't see people dying very rarely are we at the bedside of

00:31:51.940 somebody dying very rarely are we confronted with a body and so you know it's it's left our daily

00:32:01.500 experience and and it's entered into this more professional realm and so instead of there being

00:32:08.240 some dark conspiracy conspiracy out there for why we don't have this conversation I think it's a little

00:32:16.000 bit more like the need to get back to growing our own food and cooking our own food and realizing that

00:32:23.220 there's incredible value and and the pendulum swing too far in the in the direction of modernization

00:32:32.100 and technology and away from human experience so that's true in food that's true in birth and that's

00:32:38.320 true in death another one of the prompts that I liked a lot was what is the most significant end of

00:32:43.880 life experience of which you've been a part are there any answers to that question that really

00:32:48.380 stood out to you over the years um yeah there's too many of them but I mean like what I mean like

00:32:53.260 do they all have something in common right you know what they do actually yeah because there's those that

00:32:58.900 talk about a horrific loss um or a devastating loss and then there's people when you bring up

00:33:05.840 this question or questions about you know death in general and you see this this almost light

00:33:13.600 come into their face into their eyes into their being and I don't mean to get you know religious 0.99

00:33:19.560 with it because it's not what I'm saying there's but there's this this kind of glow that comes over

00:33:24.980 people when they start telling stories about how they got very present to the passing of a loved

00:33:32.200 one instead of resisting it instead of suffering through it or fighting it but turn towards the

00:33:41.300 what was the opportunity of the moment how to really be with this person that I love as they die

00:33:47.740 you know like I got into bed you know into the even the hospital bed or the hospice bed

00:33:53.460 to be next to my mom when she gave her life when she had her last breath or the whole family was around

00:33:58.960 her and it's not that there was some incredible wisdom imparted at the last moment by my grandmother

00:34:04.680 but the fact that we were all there and and with her and present for her when she had her last breath

00:34:11.460 and she gave her last breath those stories where people turn towards it it's not always the case

00:34:17.400 sometimes you know you turn towards it and the person who's dying is having a really really hard time

00:34:22.800 and that's can be that can be a very difficult experience for everybody involved but when you hear about

00:34:29.120 you know an experience where people have really stopped everything made it their priority because

00:34:37.040 the thing is it's a terrible thing to regret and that's and I regret not being there when my father

00:34:41.500 died and not spending time with him during his last years and days and and I you don't want to carry that

00:34:47.940 regret around I've talked to a lot of people that didn't drop everything thought that work or some other

00:34:54.600 thing in their life was more of a priority for some reason maybe because they didn't want to face what

00:35:00.240 was actually happening and that's a terrible burden and regret to have to carry with you and you also

00:35:06.780 have encountered people that you know that whole experience of death like they experienced it firsthand

00:35:12.220 where they had like sort of like they almost died like they're on the doorstep and that experience

00:35:17.320 like changed them forever but like yet because we don't talk about death we never get to hear about those

00:35:21.560 type of things yeah these I mean I almost call them like ghost stories right the we will tell ghost

00:35:28.240 stories but we won't talk too often about our own strange connection with people that have died it can be

00:35:36.900 like well there was I saw a ghost once or somebody saw a ghost once in a house or the number of people

00:35:44.080 who feel like they're in some level of communication whether that's just a presence or a feeling or you know

00:35:50.720 people all the way to the level of mediums or people that have had near-death experiences and

00:35:56.880 you know medically speaking they have been dead and have come back to life and have had

00:36:02.820 experiences that are very similar there's an there's archetypal experiences that people have I don't have

00:36:08.440 an opinion on what is valid or what is true I know that those experiences are very true to the people

00:36:14.900 or very meaningful and very real for the people who've had them and because we don't talk about

00:36:21.620 this death because we don't talk about the connection between those that are living and those who are dead

00:36:27.580 with any kind of comfort or any kind of literacy we don't share a great deal of our experience most

00:36:35.520 people have something to say about this you know I've felt my father's presence not in an embodied form

00:36:41.440 but just as a kind of presence in my life it's hard for me to describe mostly because we don't talk

00:36:47.460 about these things I don't have words for it since he died and and it's a real part of my experience and

00:36:53.340 I bet that most of the people listening have some kind of encounter or relationship or have at least

00:37:00.960 have somebody in their life that wants to talk to them about this kind of connection with the people

00:37:05.940 who aren't here are there certain types of deaths that people even if they you get them talking

00:37:11.340 about death like in the abstract or you know maybe even talk about specific instances there are some

00:37:16.940 instances of death where they just like people just don't like want to go there at all yeah well

00:37:22.880 that's the thing is when you have a culture that denies death represses this conversation and represses

00:37:29.880 so much I mean we repress so much emotion this is you know your your work is around

00:37:35.220 the masculine and one of the reason I think very clearly one of the reasons why we are

00:37:41.360 in such a crisis in in this country around the masculine and men are having such a hard time

00:37:48.020 first time in what a hundred years that the suicide rate you know has increased to the level where

00:37:54.300 the mortality or you know the age expectancy of white men in America is actually being reduced

00:38:01.740 you know that's a that what is that trend and the trend is as a relationship to both suicide and an

00:38:10.020 overdose and you know opioid crisis and that's a painkiller suicide is also a painkiller so when we

00:38:18.360 talk about you know what deaths or what things are off the table are too painful to talk about

00:38:25.120 that's within the context of a society that represses so many things and the reality is repression leads

00:38:33.600 to disease repression also leads to isolation and depression and so I don't think that there I think

00:38:41.020 that we want to cultivate a culture cultivate a environment where we can talk about any kind of death

00:38:48.480 any kind of loss and have it not feel like it's a stigma and so we have a lot of work to do where

00:38:55.360 people can feel comfortable where combat troops coming back you know from serving time feel comfortable

00:39:02.300 talking about the traumatic experiences they've had or doctors feel comfortable talking about

00:39:07.840 and nurses the traumatic experiences they've had in the ICU currently there's very little opportunity

00:39:13.940 there's more opportunity for soldiers than there are for doctors to talk about these things and you

00:39:19.020 know we have the highest burnout rate in the medical profession of any other profession so you know to answer

00:39:25.900 your question I'm interested in a future where there isn't a type of death that feels unmentionable

00:39:34.060 right now suicide terribly isolates the survivors it's this one of these incredible tragedies where

00:39:43.680 isolation most likely led to the fact that somebody decided that they didn't want to be here a sense

00:39:50.420 of isolation and then when somebody does commit suicide the family members we isolate as a culture

00:39:58.240 we isolate family members and survivors by not openly talking to them about their loss because we're

00:40:04.760 uncomfortable with it we feel like they must be uncomfortable with it they're thinking about it have a

00:40:09.640 conversation with people who have lost people from suicide they want they want to know you're there and they want to

00:40:15.040 know that you're willing to meet them at that level because they don't want to be left alone in it when people

00:40:21.960 have lost children you know that is a very real there's a very alive thing for them

00:40:29.420 someone who has lost and I've spent a lot of time with people who have lost children that child never goes away

00:40:35.800 they don't want to have you you know some at some point and they'll let you know if they don't want to talk about it

00:40:42.160 but people don't want to feel like they can't connect with you around what is now the most real thing in their life

00:40:50.040 you know I just saw the film Roma I don't know if you've seen it but talk about a powerful

00:40:55.540 reminder of the potency of what it means to lose a child

00:40:59.760 I'm not going to give away any spoiler but there's that exists in that movie and I don't think

00:41:06.560 I've seen a more powerful movie in cinema maybe ever in my life so we we want to we want to have

00:41:13.800 these conversations and they're not for everybody there's a lot of work that needs to be done

00:41:18.860 you know on oneself to get to the point where we're we're comfortable talking about these difficult

00:41:24.560 things but it starts by taking a risk it starts by finding out where your edge is and stepping over it

00:41:29.760 and being vulnerable so I mean having that conversation going like about you know losing

00:41:34.200 a child or say someone in their family commits suicide like how do you bring that I mean to me

00:41:39.400 it seems like you wouldn't bring that up at a death over dinner that seems like something you do

00:41:43.060 I don't know when the time was right like how do you bring up how do you broach that topic so it

00:41:48.000 sounds like people want to talk about or maybe some people don't but some people do how do you how do

00:41:53.020 you as a person who wants to like mourn with those that mourn right do that I mean is it going to be I

00:41:58.120 guess is it going to be awkward like you just have to accept that and then just see where it goes after

00:42:02.280 you you broach that line yeah no it's the fact if you have the courage because it's really a courage

00:42:08.740 issue you're doing something that is uncomfortable something that is beyond your your the known areas

00:42:16.940 of your life to go up to somebody and and say hey I'm I've been thinking about you and I've been

00:42:23.900 thinking about your loss and if you want to talk about it I want to let you know that I'm here for

00:42:28.140 you I may not be the best person for it I feel a little bit uncomfortable right now but I don't

00:42:33.540 want you to feel alone right now you can say that you can say that when you're getting coffee when you're

00:42:40.500 on a break when you run into them in the hallway you can say that via email you can say that via voice

00:42:46.680 memo you can say that via facebook messenger there's any number of ways that you can say that thing

00:42:52.980 and that is never going to be I would say almost never going to be a met with like go away and how

00:42:59.340 dare you right and so if we're looking for the right moment to say something as simple and human

00:43:07.080 as what I just said it's now it's it's and then it's now and then it's now and it's now if you have

00:43:13.060 somebody in your life who's had one of these devastating losses there is nothing but good that

00:43:18.540 is going to come from saying hey I've been thinking about you and I want you to know you can

00:43:23.300 talk to me about this and just be honest about the fact I'm not a therapist obviously you know that I'm

00:43:28.600 not even good at these conversations I'm scared as hell to bring it up to you but I really don't want

00:43:33.340 you to feel alone it's more important to me that you don't feel alone right that that to me like

00:43:39.840 the person's going to be impacted pretty powerfully so we've been talking about uh speaking of kids

00:43:46.940 like how do you should you have these like dinner death over dinner conversations with your with

00:43:52.740 your kids and if so how do you how do you bring that up or do kids just bring it up yeah you've got

00:43:57.320 kids right I do have kids yeah yeah do they do they ask are they curious about death uh my oldest my

00:44:03.500 oldest is pretty existential yeah which is it's like he's like I don't know yeah he's like an

00:44:08.560 existential philosopher and he's eight yeah totally so a lot so here's the thing is every kid you know

00:44:15.000 they're all snowflakes right they all have their own personality from the moment they're born or way

00:44:20.480 before they're born who knows when they're imparted that but I've got a couple girls one is 18 one's 10 0.74

00:44:26.540 and it's very much like anybody with kids the if they're curious about it if they want to have this

00:44:35.460 conversation if they're asking questions then meet them there right the the thing that you don't want

00:44:40.660 to do with a kid is be like don't talk about that or we don't talk about that or repress or shame them

00:44:46.400 around that conversation you're starting a pattern where they you're telling them one that they can't

00:44:51.620 be their authentic self you know which and that they have to change the way that they're being in

00:44:56.940 order to get your love and you know that's it's one thing when they decide when they decided to do

00:45:02.440 something like run into the street like you want to shame them that's keeping them safe but when

00:45:08.760 someone or your kid wants to talk about something existential that maybe even makes you uncomfortable

00:45:13.660 tell them say hey it makes me uncomfortable but I hear that you're curious and so let's maybe explore

00:45:19.080 this together kids who have any some anxiety around it they're really reaching out and telling you that

00:45:24.940 they have some concern and worry you can tell them listen we're very much alive right now some kids you

00:45:31.880 know don't sleep because they think about death and nothingness and you can tell them hey we're very

00:45:37.280 much alive right now everybody in our life is very much alive let's breathe let's be in our body let's be

00:45:43.500 grateful for that and you know and maybe not in the middle of night think about things that are

00:45:47.700 existential but during the day let's do some exploration you know your kids are telling you

00:45:52.280 something very essential about themselves when they start asking these questions now if they're not

00:45:56.220 curious my 10 year old is like poor girl has to deal with being adjacent to or in whether she wants

00:46:04.140 to be or not conversations about death all the time she has zero interest in it zero and so and she

00:46:13.080 literally feel like headphones and I don't think she's even avoiding it she's just not it's not really

00:46:18.000 that it's not relevant to her right now and she doesn't want to make it relevant and so I don't ever

00:46:23.840 push the conversation on my 18 year old you know we delve into all types of realms of conversations

00:46:29.580 about this yeah what what does your 10 year old say when like people ask what did your dad do

00:46:33.960 um you you know that's a good question she will say well he writes you know he wrote wrote a book and

00:46:42.340 he does it probably dinners and what's the book about it's about death and she will roll her eyes a little

00:46:47.500 right i can see that that's a clear indication that don't don't further the conversation and I

00:46:55.240 imagine you can have multiple of these dinners like with the same people right this is like an

00:46:59.320 ongoing conversation this isn't like a one and done thing it's like all right check it off did my

00:47:03.900 talked about death like you could keep it going for months even years yeah this is this is a this is

00:47:10.060 the opening and you know you you don't necessarily need to once you've cracked open the conversation at a

00:47:16.480 death dinner I don't think you necessarily need to use the model again and again you might you might

00:47:22.440 want to use it with certain people different people but once you've cracked the seal on this

00:47:28.180 conversation with your family and friends um hopefully you you know you now just have some

00:47:34.460 access to delving into this level of discussion more readily and then there are other tools out

00:47:40.440 there you know there's death cafes and there's the conversation project and there's we croak and you

00:47:46.340 know there's a bunch of great resources we're just out there just doing one you know hitting one

00:47:51.720 kind of note in a whole kind of i guess symphony of stuff how do you uh end the death over dinner

00:47:57.780 party is it just like well all right see you see you tomorrow next week yeah so endings are really

00:48:05.520 important psychologically it's been proven that we remember right the the beginning and the ending of

00:48:11.140 an experience more so than you know anything that happened in the middle um first impressions are

00:48:18.200 really important so our last impressions and so the way that we have devised it is for is called an

00:48:24.380 appreciation in the round and we have everybody go around and say something they admire about the

00:48:30.320 person sitting on their left so that everybody gets appreciated or admired once and that actually

00:48:35.540 what that does kind of chemically it's almost like closing a wound is maybe too gruesome but it it

00:48:42.980 creates a a chemical change in your body that lets you know that you can enter back into the not

00:48:49.380 talking about death world and you know when you get appreciated or admire somebody you have oxytocin

00:48:56.680 you know and some other like very positive chemical outputs that your brain is creating and surging

00:49:04.420 through your body and and that lets you know lets you know you're no longer in the depths of of

00:49:10.240 triggering conversation potentially triggering i don't want to it's not like all of these some some of

00:49:15.360 these conversations are i'd say even the majority are just beautiful this isn't a morbid conversation

00:49:20.580 well michael this has been a great conversation where can people go to learn more about the project

00:49:24.920 yeah well so death over dinner.org and we're part of a family of initiatives really extraordinary

00:49:32.120 global well-being movement and company called round glass so that is www dot round dot g-l-a-s-s

00:49:42.120 round glass all right well michael hebb thanks so much time it's been a pleasure absolutely thanks

00:49:45.580 for having me my guest today was michael hebb he's the founder of death over dinner you can find out

00:49:50.140 more information about that organization by going to death over dinner.org also check out his book

00:49:54.420 let's talk about death over dinner available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere basically a blueprint

00:49:59.120 for you on how to plan a death over dinner party and what to talk about also check out our show

00:50:03.560 notes at aom.is slash death over dinner where you can find links to resources where you can delve deeper

00:50:08.540 into this topic

00:50:09.320 well that wraps up another edition of the aom podcast check out our podcast archives at

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00:50:44.880 aom podcast but put what you've heard into action

The Art of Manliness - April 17, 2019

#500： Let's Talk About Death Over Dinner

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