What do funeral directors and cemetery operators do all day? How do they help grieving people? Find out in this illuminating conversation with Gail Rubin and Heather Leigh. This was part of the Reimagine: Life, Loss, & Love Virtual Festival.
Heather Leigh, General Manager of Greenhaven Memorial Gardens, is also a Certified Funeral Celebrant and Grief Recovery Specialist. She walks with families through the death of a loved one and creates unique, personalized memorial services.
In this conversation with Gail Rubin, Certified Thanatologist and pioneering death educator, they discuss topics such as:
- Planning ahead for your funeral and why it’s important.
- What do you do with men who say, “Just throw me in a ditch, I’ll be dead.”?
- Can people sell previously purchased burial plots?
- Common questions that people ask about funerals, cremation, and working with the dead.
- Why people avoid funeral planning.
- Funerals, memorial services, celebrations of life – what’s the point?
- How to have “the conversation” with your family and why it’s important.
This event was part of the groundbreaking virtual death discussion festival Reimagine: Life, Loss & Love. A Good Goodbye is collaborating with event hosts around the world to co-create this much-needed exploration of death-related topics. Events focus on embracing life, facing death, and loving fully, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The books mentioned during the conversation (Amazon affiliate links):
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward
You can also obtain the free 50-point Executor’s Checklist from Gail Rubin’s book, Kicking The Bucket List: 100 Downsizing and Organizing Things to Do Before You Die through this web page: https://agoodgoodbye.com/kicking-the-bucket/use-this-executors-checklist-to-smooth-estate-transitions/.