The Coffee Shop: People’s Organic

The Cup: Anne and I both opted for hot tea. Hers was a lovely coconut tea and mine was ginger and turmeric – quite possibly one of the best cups of herbal tea I’ve ever enjoyed! Also, a shout out to People’s Organic for having bubbly water on tap. LOVE that!

The Connection: A few weeks back I had the pleasure of sharing with you Cup 125 Jane Whitlock. She emailed several days after our coffee to tell me she had someone I might be interested in meeting. Anne is a friend and you might call her a colleague of Jane’s – they both provide services in the end-of-life space. She sounded interesting, and since Jane knew I was looking for beams of sunshine or bolts of lightning, I trusted her recommendation. Anne and I connected and set up our meeting.

Anne is someone full of passion for what she does. She has reinvented herself a time of two in life, but when she truly began to listen to that all-knowing inner voice, she was led to the path that feels purposeful and impactful in a way Anne hadn’t felt professionally in years. In fact, she reflected that this was less of a new adventure, and more of a homecoming. We’ll get deeper in that and so much more, but first, a few:

Common Grounds

1. How did you make your first buck? Babysitting and washing cars. We’d go around the neighborhood and wash people’s cars for, like, a dollar.
2. What book should be required reading for everyone? Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. It really shifted my view on the world and led to my curiosity and spirituality. It’s about suffering — some of which is internal and some of which is external, and that we cannot sequester ourselves and avoid experiencing it. If we deny our suffering, then we deny our happiness, because you can’t have one without the other.
3. What’s the best gift you ever got? Being alive. My life is my greatest gift, and there are new gifts every day.
4. What’s a food you can’t live without? Since it’s fall, my answer is soup. If we were to talk in the summer time, it would be salads.
5. What’s your guilty pleasure? I love listening to new music – spending time listening to a song I’ve never heard before. I love world music! Also, going on solo adventures and exploring on my own.

Party Time

Imagine you are throwing the biggest, most important party of your lifetime. The party to end all parties. The one everyone will talk about for years and years and the one that will leave an indelible impression on every guest. Would you begin planning the night before, leave everything to chance and just hope for the best? Of course not! This is the analogy Anne uses when talking about the lack of preparation and planning she sees around the biggest journey and transformation we’ll ever take: dying.

On a mission to not simply change the conversation about dying, in many cases, Anne is on a mission to spark the conversation.

Into The Wild

Anne arrived at this place after a transformational journey of her own and a lot of reflection. Reflecting back as far as her childhood days, filled with outdoor adventuring with her brother and neighborhood friend. Then in college, there was more adventuring. Anne tells me, “In college I worked summers at a camp in Northern Minnesota, Camp Widjiwagen, leading backpacking and canoeing trips with young women. What drew me to that work was that I’d grown up Catholic, but the Catholic faith landed flat for me. While I respected the values and the teachings I learned, I was looking for a different connection and I really found that through outdoor wilderness tripping. Those times outside, leading trips and being in the wilderness, allowed me to connect to something that I felt was greater than myself. It was the springboard for me to move into the deeper wilderness of the mind. And eventually, the journeying that we do with people at the end of life.”

Part guide, part educator, part party planner and host, Anne helps people navigate the world of goodbyes, life celebrations, grief, expectations, final voyages and honest conversations. She opens the doors for conversation and from there, just like any great party, the results all look very personal and very different.

Anne didn’t arrive at this personal calling without time and effort. She shares with me, “Seven years ago I went on an inward journey to unravel what mine is to do in this world. The answer came in whispers, almost like a tap on the shoulder. I’ve always had a desire to give back and to do something that would support life rather than hinder it. So I made space to reflect on what was next. It sounds really airy, but I was in a meditation and I asked the question, ‘What is mine to do?’, and the response was ‘Do healing work and work with the dying.’ It was clear; I didn’t question it. I let it sink in and then I started exploring — what is healing work and what is dying work? And where do I insert myself in this world? There’s all kind of places I could go — social work, chaplaincy, nursing, estate planning. So I just got curious, like a kid would – following the questions.”

The Foundation

“Early on, I heard Frank Ostaseski speak about the five invitations of dying. What I heard from him is how do we presence ourselves with someone else, in the midst of deep loss and suffering? That was a moment when I realized what I wanted to do. And that is the foundation of what I do.” Anne combines all her experience and knowledge and offers services through her business, A Thousand Hands, that meet the needs of individuals and loved ones.

A big part of what Anne does with her clients is educating them about home vigiling and family directed after death care. Anne explains home vigils, “That’s when families take some time after death to care for their loved one. Body washing, anointing, sitting with their loved one after death to really help that transition. To recognize the death has occurred, to be with the death and to release the loved one. Having that spaciousness to celebrate and honor the person in a way that feels supportive to them.”

“A lot of times we rush that process,” Anne explains. She says, “I see myself as an educator. I believe that we know how to usher life in, and we know how to usher life out, it’s just that we’ve forgotten. And we’ve forgotten because we have moved to more of a service industry. We hire out everything. What I’m advocating for is for people to reflect upon and take some time to create consciousness around death so they’re able to meet it with some knowing of maybe what that might look like for them. I find it troubling to hear from people who almost have a secondary grief because a loved one died in a way that was really dramatic and it didn’t need to be — it’s not the way they wanted it. Or they were picked up sooner than they wanted.”

Holding Space

So what is the answer? For Anne, it’s fairly simple. She says it’s about taking the time to imagine, in an ideal world, what do your final days and hours hold? Anne explains,” Vigil is that time when you’re moving into your dying. What do you want that to look like? Who is there? What space would you be in? What would it smell like? Would someone be making soup or cookies? Would you have a friend over playing the guitar? Would there be children? Would your dog be there resting with you on your bed? Would you want people to touch you, or sing to you or talk to you softly? Start visualizing — just like you would when you’re planning a party. We plan things all the time – I don’t understand why we don’t do that in death.”

As I hear Anne explain all of this so comfortably, as if she truly is just planning a grand fiesta, I realize, just like all difficult topics, warming up to dying is achieved through breaking the silence. Shifting it from morbid or off-limits and making it normal and a suitable topic for the dinner table. Maybe even a topic so benign that we could talk about it with perfect strangers. {Yep, I’m gonna go there!}

Back To The Living

I ask Anne whose life has had the greatest impact on her and she tells me, “My husband David, for sure. We’ve been married 17 years and I feel like our relationship has had the most impact on me. I do not underestimate the power of being completely loved for who I am. There’s almost a relentlessness to it. He loves me and sees me for who I am. He’s supportive and loyal and he’s a really good dad! He, in a lot of ways, is my opposite. So he’s offered a lot of opportunities for me to learn more about myself.”

A simple change Anne has made in her life that’s had a huge impact is learning to play the guitar. She says, “I love it. I just find music to be really inspiring and to be able to play it on my own — now I see music in a whole other way because I realize how much goes into crafting a song and making music.”

Energy Conservation

How about a daily practice that adds to her overall happiness, success or well being? Anne shares. “Just like we get prepared in the winter time and put on warm pants, a coat and a hat, every morning I energetically go through a meditation to protect my energetic field. I do this so that I’m keeping my energy to myself and so that people are good in their energy, but it’s not going to affect mine.”

With that magical 30 seconds to make a speech to the world, Anne has this to offer: “For me the greatest lesson that we can learn in this lifetime is to move from separation consciousness to unity consciousness. That deep knowing that we are connected to the earth, air, water and fire, that those elements live with in us and outside of us and are vital to all life on planet earth. So get outside! Educate yourself about how we can tread lightly on our planet. See others as a mirror reflection of you and a part of this miraculous web of life that we are re-spinning and re-weaving at this very moment to be more respectful, compassionate and just for every being and future generations. The challenges that we face are oftentimes our greatest teachers; providing the opportunity to see things in a new way. So get curious, be kind to yourself and other and slow down, slow down, slow down. Practice kindness. Love and listen to yourself. Build your community and ask for help when you need it. We are all artists and creators; pay attention to what is wanting to be created through you. Get outside, play music, sing, dance and practice gratitude.”

Into Action

• Imagine your final days and begin to visualize what that looks like under ideal circumstances. Once you have some ideas, write them down. And once it’s written down, share those wishes with the people you love. For more on vigils, you’ll enjoy Anne’s blog post on the topic!
• Invite death and dying to the dinner table. Ask questions. Share stories. Talk about your fears, your hopes, your curiosities. Make it as normal a topic as weekend plan making, sharing gratitudes or fantasy football.
• Feeling stuck professionally? It happens to the best of us. Anne’s story offers the idea of looking back to the carefree days of our childhood as we look for clues to the answer. What did you love doing as a kid? What did you imagine you’d be when you grew up? What job did you take in high school or college? You might be surprised to realize those childhood memories hold a key to your deeper purpose. Take the time to explore.
• Spend time in silence. It’s amazing how answers come to us when we simply stop looking.
• Go out and explore your world. Shake things up and invite a change of scenery. Have a new conversation. Drive a new route. Get groceries somewhere different. Make small talk in the line for coffee. Ask a stranger about their views on dying. I will if you will! 

Until next time, you mortal (and marvelous) soul, be well, love big and stay curious! xo