Hey, talking about death won’t kill you.
It helps you to deeply appreciate and make the most of your quality time remaining.
A Death Café is a scheduled non-profit get-together (called “social franchises” by the organizers) to talk about death over food and drink, with a view to helping people make the most of their (finite) lives. Facilitators have said that there is “a need among people to open the closet into which death, the ‘last taboo,’ has been placed, to reduce fear and enable people to live more fully.
The idea originated with the Swiss sociologist and anthropologist Bernard Crettaz, who organized the first Café Mortel in 2004. Jon Underwood, a UK web developer, was inspired by Crettaz’s work, introduced the death cafe to London in 2011, and launched the Death Cafe website. Death Cafes held in 93 countries.
I’ve been attending virtual Death Cafes since early December 2024. What I love about them is the depth and authenticity of conversation. I have little use for small talk. Never have. And my distaste for it only increases with age.
Crettaz said that his aim in launching Café Mortel was to break the “tyrannical secrecy” surrounding the topic of death, and that at these gatherings, “the assembled company, for a moment, and thanks to death, is born into authenticity.”
Many laypeople participate in Death Cafes. Also, I’m pleasantly surprised to have met many professionals in the death industry from whom I’ve learned much about end-of-life choices. These are death doulas, hospice nurses and volunteers.
I leave each Death Café feeling informed, inspired and more connected to my humanness.
Break the taboo and talk about death.
(They are in 93 countries)