December 17th, 2007. The day of my mother’s death. I can remember where I was standing when my brothers called me. 9:23 am, in my kitchen, in front of the stove. It was odd hearing from Spencer that morning. His halting, but loving voice came over the line.
“Margaret, Mom died.“
Just three words. I was shocked, even though she was in her early 80s.
She hadn’t been well mentally, but physically, supposedly had no problems. I don’t remember much about the next few hours, except I cancelled my patients for the next few days. It was hard to decide what to say.
“A death in the family†didn’t sound right somehow.
It wasn’t enough.
I remember wishing that I had known that she was going to die, because I didn’t have anything to wear. It was a terribly silly thing to think, but a distraction. My mother was always beautifully dressed, and she was patiently waiting for me to get out of my “jeans periodâ€, as she called it. I chose an olive green outfit, but knew that Mother didn’t really like me in green.
That bothered me.
When I saw my mother’s body, it was so odd. Maybe it was because I had not seen her die. An awful sound gushed out of my throat, like a wounded animal.
I was alone, having driven down from Fayetteville, Arkansas to Pine Bluff, my home town. My family owns the funeral home, so they had put her body back in the chapel area, where I had been many times in the past, often with her.
I so wanted her to move, to respond to me. That’s when it began to sink in.
I had worked at the funeral home during the summers. I had seen many people dead.
Just not my mom. Not my mother.
First, we had a private service with my father who was too physically frail to attend a church service. Held in their bedroom, it was tender and moving.
Her funeral was a comedy of errors.
My mother had been a Juilliard-trained musician, as a pianist and organist. I had met with the organist and the pastor to specifically plan regal, ceremonious music, music that my mother would have loved.
They, unfortunately, decided to take matters into their own hands.
Instead of playing what I had requested, the pastor had opted for some ditty called, “Life is a Symphonyâ€. It sounded like music you would hear at a carnival. Literally oom-pah-pah, oom-pah-pah. I expected a performing monkey to run down the aisle at any moment.
I was disgusted. My brother Adam’s shoulders were shaking with silent laughter.
Mother would have left if she could have.
As the family followed the casket down the aisle at the end of the service, I had a severe panic attack. Maybe it looked like I was distraught. I was trembling, sweating. I had filled myself full of beta blockers before the service, anticipating such a response. Still the panic won. I shook uncontrollably, almost fell in my high-heeled boots, and clung to the usher who was leading me out. I rushed into the waiting limousine.
Dad died one week later, on Christmas Eve. He had been very ill. His death, although terribly hard for us emotionally, was a blessing for him.
We were numb at that point. We planned his service for a few days later. I had time to actually go buy a dress. I walked into the store, making a joke about needing a dress for a funeral, while inside my heart was breaking.
I bought low heeled pumps.
At the church, many people kindly said, “They loved each other so much, they were supposed to go togetherâ€. You know, that stuff doesn’t help and I don’t believe it anyway. I have known a lot of people who deeply loved their spouses, who outlived them many years. I think my father had been sick for so long that he may have given himself permission to let go.
But that’s it.
Christmas was a blur.
Christmas of 2008 was also hard. I made a point of giving each grandchild a piece of my mother’s jewelry. That’s how I coped. As a family, we did a “dirty Santa†game, which was something we had never had as a tradition. It helped us through our vulnerability, but it’s interesting that we haven’t done it since.
To everything there is a season.
I have watched many people go through the holidays, trying to cope with complicated emotions. Many are mourning what their families never were, are not now or never will be capable of being. Sexual abuse, alcoholism and drug abuse, even neglect or emotional estrangement becomes more poignant during the time of the year.
It stings more.
If there has been death during this time, and especially if it’s a death by suicide, it can feel like you are trudging through each day, waiting to take a big breath in January.
If you have lost someone you love this year, or if it’s the anniversary of their death, you can celebrate their life by creating a ritual that is meaningful for you. You can honor that they are still alive in your heart and mind, and always will be.
I plan to do the same.
You can read more of Dr. Margaret on her website. Just click here.
Earlier on Huff/Post50:
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The CNN news anchor and journalist attended a weekend-long mindfulness retreat with meditation expert Jon Kabat-Zinn this year.
Speaking on ’60 Minutes Overtime’ after his experience, Cooper said: “I don’t feel I’m very present in each moment.
“I feel like every moment I’m either thinking about something that’s coming down the road or something that’s been in the past.
“I meditate. Like, I try. Not every day, but even if I’m not doing that meditation, the moments of my day have changed because I’m not on my phone so much. I’m intentionally not checking my phone every two seconds.â€
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Speaking to Rolling Stones magazine in August 2014, Katy Perry explained why she’s such a big fan of transcendental meditation.
“For people that are so creative and have this kind of creative faucet that never turns off – it just continues and continues – it can be a little exhausting,†she said.
“And, you know, with the continual responsibility of having 127 people on the road, and always being the point person for everything, my subconscious is going even when I’m sleeping.
“I’m dreaming about whatever I’m creating next, or relationships, or blah, blah, blah. So I’m never really off. And meditation is actually the one time I get to really reset.â€
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This year Virgin Group founder Richard Branson has been more outspoken than ever about putting employees’ wellbeing first.
Speaking to Inc in August he said: “If the person who works at your company is 100% proud of the brand and you give them the tools to do a good job and they are treated well, they’re going to be happy.
“If the person who works at your company is not appreciated, they are not going to do things with a smile. Effectively, in the end shareholders do well, the customers do better, and your staff remains happy.â€
In September he went on to implement what is without doubt the
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Despite being just 16 and 14, respectively, the siblings (children of Will and Jada Pinkett-Smith) gave one of the most mindful interviews of the year.
Speaking to New York Times, the pair spoke about meditation and being present:
WILLOW: Breathing is meditation; life is a meditation. You have to breathe in order to live, so breathing is how you get in touch with the sacred space of your heart.
JADEN: When babies are born, their soft spots bump: It has, like, a heartbeat in it. That’s because energy is coming through their body, up and down.
WILLOW: Prana energy.
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Mohamed El-Erian resigned as CEO of investment fund Pimco in January 2014. The true reason for his resignation was revealed in September.
El-Erian’s 10-year-old daughter confronted him with a list of all the important moments he had missed because of his job, including his daughter’s first school football match, her first day of school and her parent-teacher evening.
El-Erian’s resignation reminds us all that success can’t always be defined by money and power.
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In September a cross-party parliamentary group said wellbeing should be the top priority.
The all-party group’s chairman, Labour MP David Lammy, said: “It has been eight years since David Cameron first declared his intention to measure wellbeing, and in that time the financial crisis has shifted many people’s priorities. But in fact wellbeing matters more, not less, in times of economic difficulties.
“Fundamentally this is about creating the conditions for people to live better lives, which should be the primary objective of all policy.â€
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Comedian Ruby Wax has long been a fan of meditation, but in 2014 her open discussion on how the practice helped her combat depression brought the topic to the masses.
As part of her 2014 Sane New World tour, she explored the topic of mindfulness and in an interview with The Telegraph in August 2014, she said: “I wake up around 9am then meditate for 20 minutes.
“I practise mindfulness, which involves letting my garbage go through my brain but always bringing my focus to my breathing. It’s not something I ‘believe in’ – I know from brain research what’s going on, so it’s not a holy thing.
“I try to do it every morning, or failing that I do it in a taxi or on a train.â€
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During a Commons education select committee hearing on child wellbeing, Siobhain McDonagh, Labour MP for Mitcham and Morden, asked Liberal Democrat Daid Laws: “What part do courses in mindfulness play in raising child wellbeing, does the Department for Education plan to promote such courses?â€
In reply, the minister said: “I think we are very interested in promoting this and we certainly think that it’s an area that merits consideration based on the evidence we’ve seen to date.â€
Laws was then asked by committee chairman Graham Stuart, Conservative MP for Beverley and Holderness, to explain the concept of mindfulness.
He told the cross-party group of MPs: “It’s about trying to impact on people’s motivations, their attitudes to life, it’s about trying to get at some of the things we don’t always get at through our crude technical interventions and I think it’s an area that we should take seriously while making sure that there is proper evidence-based scrutiny of it.â€
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Hilaria Baldwin became more well-known for yoga in 2014 than being the wife of the famous Alec Baldwin.
You can see some of her insane poses here or watch her video on yoga poses to help you sleep here.
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London mayor Boris Johnson makes sure his staff at City Hall receive free help to help with mindfulness.
A spokesperson told HuffPost UK: “We have a wellbeing portal on our intranet which provides resources to staff on a range of topics to do with health and wellbeing.
“These include mindfulness podcasts which we have promoted to staff since May 2014.
“As an employer we believe improving employees’ ability to maintain their health and wellbeing, handle pressure and balance work and home life is commonsense, because ultimately it leads to improved individual and organisational performance.â€
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A number of leading footballers were reported to be receiving help and support from psychologists and practicing mindfulness before and during the 2014 FIFA World Cup.
The players wanted to find balance and the inner strength to cope with the pressures of the game.
England’s Daniel Sturridge is known to have devoted one hour of his pre-match preparations to psychiatrist Steve Peters before his World Cup debut in June.
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Even Miss Moneypenny knows the value of sleep.
In a recent interview with the Evening Standard, actress Naomie Harris said: “When I’m filming Bond the most important thing is getting enough sleep.
“I wear cosy monogrammed pyjamas and a silk eye mask, apply Dr Gowri Motha night oil and listen to a hypnotherapy sleep CD.â€
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Bert from Sesame Street and actor Zachary Levi know we all need to switch off our screens in order to reconnect with ourselves once in a while.
They released this pro-digital detox video telling fans to get off Facebook and enjoy the great outdoors during the summertime.
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Former head of the civil service Gus O’Donnell warned politicians that they should consider wellbeing as well as the economy when making policy in March of this year.
Gus O’Donnell proved he’s a man who understands that success is more than money and power when he said: “GDP alone is not enough. To measure a country’s progress, we also need to look at how satisfied we are with our lives and how worthwhile our lives are.â€
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Goldman Sachs became joined other financial firms in the City of London in offering meditation and mindfulness sessions, so we though it was only fair to add its CEO Lloyd Blankfein to our list.
In May, Sally Boyle, head of human capital management at Goldman Sachs, said: “In years to come we’ll be talking about mindfulness as we talk about exercise.â€