Can contemplating death inform a better life

According to Chaplain Devin Sean Moss, death “informs how we live.” The idea of impermanence —the notion that everything is in a constant state of flux— and a “meditation on finitude,” Moss suggests, is a  “cheat code of sorts to making deliberate and intentional decisions and forces the hand of what are my values…to know what my core is about.”   

For most people,  the subject and contemplation of death and dying is hardly a source of inpiration. We fill our lives  with work, travel,  and spending time with friends and family. These are life affirming activities to keep our minds from wandering too far down to our inevitable end. 

For Devin Moss, confronting death has been both equally a sobering  and inspiring journey. As a Humanist Chaplain, Devin Moss forged a year-long bond with Phillip Hancock who was executed by the state of Oklahoma for a double murder. Moss’s experience was chronicled by the New York Times and the subject of an earlier Life Examined.

More: Facing death without God: Spiritual care in the final hours of a death row inmate

Today, Moss writes and hosts the podcast The Adventures of Memento Mori in which he explores the science, mysticism, culture, and mystery of death. Moss regularly grapples with his own mortality and says its a mistake for our culture to shy away from the topic - “the inability to talk about it on a societal level has very harmful byproducts.” Moss suggests that the message society perpetuates is that there is a misunderstanding of what it means to be finite, and that “everything is limitless.”  

And when it comes to death itself, Moss urges listeners not to be deterred by fear or not knowing what to do or say. “Just be okay with the unknown and do all that you can do to make it about the other person, to heck with being good at it or knowing what you're doing.” For Moss, it’ss “the ability, not what I can learn from this person as they pass, but more like, how can I ensure that their passing is maintained as a sacred act within a sacred space.” 

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KCRW's Life Examined is a one-hour weekly show exploring science, philosophy, faith — and finding meaning in the modern world. The show is hosted by Jonathan Bastian. Please tune in Sundays at 9 a.m., or find it as a podcast.