How to live, grieve, and die in community with Alua Arthur
Today is our final episode of our mini-series exploring death and dying with today's ingenious guest, Alua Arthur. Alua Arthur is a death doula, recovering attorney, and the founder of Going with Grace, a death doula training and end-of-life planning organization. Connect with Alua and explore her work with Going With Grace here.
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“Death rites and rituals are not really for the person who’s dead. They are for the people who are carrying that memory on.”
“It’s the most important thing in the world —- orienting towards living your life as fully as possible.”
“What I want to do is empower people to trust themselves in their intuition and to clear as much space within themselves to go out and channel this work from other people: people that have come before and the people sitting right in front of them.”
“Once you experience grief, you don’t go back to not grieving. You are grieving for the rest of your life, just in different ways. Grief changes form.”
“We will always be our greatest teachers ourselves, but our greatest teachers are also the people at the feet of which we sit, other people who have done this work, mostly the dying person and all the human beings.”
“The curiosity about life’s biggest mystery is as normal as being alive itself.”
“Grief is not only associated with death. Death can come in many forms.”
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Pocket Casts, and RadioPublic
Show Notes
[0:01:00] Grief and death, and how they present themselves
[0:13:00] Desiring to make a difference in people's lives in some manner, when the law was the only option
[0:15:00] Using every aspect of who you are, not a portion of yourself that you can discard
[0:18:00] The most essential thing in the world is to focus on enjoying your life to the fullest extent possible
[0:28:00] A container in which we may observe and be with one another in the midst of our deepest pain
[0:29:00] Having the desire to empower others to trust their intuition and to clear as much space inside themselves as possible so that they may go out and channel this work from others: both those who have gone before them and those who are currently in front of them
[0:32:00] Why can't we go back to not mourning after experiencing sadness? What does it mean we will continue to grieve for the rest of our lives but in various ways? Grief does take on new forms!
[0:34:00] Because we don't live in isolation, the community is an important aspect of the course and the job in general.
[0:35:00] Our greatest teachers will always be ourselves, but they will also be the people at our feet, other individuals who have done this task, most notably the dying person.
[0:37:00] Curiosity in life's greatest enigma is as natural as breathing.
Resources and People Mentioned
Alua Arthur is a death doula, recovering attorney, and the founder of Going with Grace
Follow Going with Grace on IG @going_with_grace or visit Going with Grace