What Is The Death Positive Movement?
What does it mean to be death positive?
If you are familiar with grief and death, you may have heard of the “death positive” movement. Those words are enough to send some people running, sounding like a celebration of death. However, the death-positive movement does not hope to hasten death or dismiss grief; instead, it seeks to remove the stigma in our society surrounding death by opening up space to discuss it.
Western society is clearly preoccupied with death. It appears in TV, movies, and music. And yet, most of us are deeply uncomfortable discussing it in real terms. Instead of allowing the universal experience of death to bring us closer, the death stigma in our culture alienates us from each other. This distance from death is new - not so long ago, people died in the family home, and their bodies were attended to in the salon. This new discomfort with death deeply impacts our ability to enjoy life.
What “death positive” means
The phrase “death positive” came from Caitlin Doughty, a mortician and founder of The Order of the Good Death, a collective that works for a more honest discussion about death in our society. She wondered why there was so much talk about “sex positivity” without an equivalent attitude about death, one that seeks to acknowledge and explore our natural curiosity about death, accept death as a part of life, and normalize having conversations about death.
What the positive death movement looks like
The death positive movement seeks to engage with the difficult questions around death. Robert Neimeyer, PhD, director of the Portland Institute for Loss and Transition, describes it as “a way of moving toward neutral acceptance of death and embracing values which make us more conscious of our day-to-day living.” Being cognizant of our inevitable death can enhance the lives we lead. You can download the app WeCroak, which will remind you of your mortality five times a day. This was inspired by the Buddhist idea that contemplating death five times a day helps people embrace uncertainty and live their best lives.
Death Cafes are a popular way to provide space to talk about death. Strangers can gather and share snacks while having unstructured discussions about mortality. It is important to note that these do not support groups. You might be familiar with death doulas, who provide end of life care the same way a birth doula provides support during pregnancy and childbirth. (Read our blog on death doulas here.) Many young people are embracing the idea of pre-planning their funerals. You can even use an app or website to create a will and plan a funeral. By getting your affairs in order now, you may be able to enjoy the rest of your life more fully.
In New Zealand, Coffin Clubs provide a space for people to gather and make coffins for themselves or loved ones. These gatherings are about community building and normalizing discussions of death as they are about building the actual coffin.
The movement encourages greener death technology. The Order of the Good Death holds as one of its tenets that “death should be handled in a way that does not do great harm to the environment.” Burial and cremation are both very harmful to the environment, and there has been growing interest in alternatives like caskets made of fungus.
What “death positive” doesn’t mean
There are many myths and misunderstandings about what death positive means, and that’s to be expected with something seemingly controversial. Death positive does not mean celebrating or trivializing death. It means becoming more comfortable acknowledging and discussing death. Death positive does not mean dismissing the significance of grief. By reducing death stigma, we can actually enhance the services provided to those who are grieving. Death positive does not mean being unafraid of death. It is natural to have some fear of death. By being death positive, we can talk about those fears and prevent them from ruling our lives.
How you can get involved
If the death positive movement interests you, there are several things you can do to bring it into your life. You can participate in a Death Cafe, many of which have gone virtual during the pandemic. You can speak more openly with loved ones about death, grief, and funeral planning. (Read our blog on funeral planning here.) You might want to consider pre-planning your funeral. Whether or not you have experienced a death, becoming more comfortable talking about death takes practice. Remember that being death positive is a process; it doesn’t mean you have no fear of death. It means you’re ready to talk about it as a part of life.
Sources
https://www.talkdeath.com/the-death-positive-movement/
https://nerdist.com/article/death-positive-movement/
https://blog.funeralone.com/news/death-positive-movement/
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/22/nyregion/the-positive-death-movement-comes-to-life.html
https://www.healthline.com/health-news/the-death-positive-movement#Death-as-a-community-builder-
http://www.orderofthegooddeath.com/death-positive-not
http://www.orderofthegooddeath.com/resources/death-positive-movement
