"With some real attention to the design of palliative care and hospitals, we can totally transform what the process of dying becomes for people. Instead of a gruesome, clinical, scary process, it can be, by design, a concentrated crescendo of all the things it means to be living, packed into those final months and days.
Think about it: At a time when a person is struggling with the biggest hurdle of their lives — leaving their lives behind and not existing corporeally anymore — they are often completely cut off from the humanity and experience of life they so desperately are wishing to exercise while they fleetingly still can.
Like feeling their dog lying at the foot of their bed with a cold nose against them. The feelings and quick snapshots in time that, strung together, make up a life.
BJ calls this "sensuous aesthetic gratification," putting words to those moments where we're tactilely rewarded just for being alive.
He makes a moving case for why the entire process of dying should be comprised of more moments of pure living.
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A horrible accident when he was goofing off made him think deeply about what people need when dying.
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