Water Blessing Label Bookmarks for Focused Healing

In September 2009 The Spirit of Water added several news products to their product line that I have already supported in this blog and in the NICU Parent Support Blog.

The new product that I am really excited about is their Water Blessing Labels Bookmarks, particularly the one for focused healing.

Blessing for Weight Loss, Focused Healing and for Awakening

There are three news Water Blessing Label Bookmarks, one for Weight Loss, one for Focused Healing and another for Awakening.

• The 6 phrases on blessing labels for Weight Loss are: "fresh start," "mindful eating," "breakthrough," "vibrant health," "ageless beauty," and "boundless energy."
• The 6 words on blessing labels for the Focused healing are: "acceptance," "serenity," "courage," "patience," "humor," and "energy."
• The 6 words on blessing labels words for Awakening are: "love,""gratitude,""peace," and "joy."

The Focused Healing labels contain the 6 static-cling blessing labels, bookmark and inspirational mini cards. The words on the bookmark carry a healing message as well:

You are guided from within as your healing journey brings you back to yourself.

The bookmark can be used to inspire you in your healing process. Place it in a book as a reminder of your healing journey.

More affordable
These bookmarks are a smaller number of blessing labels than the regular size, so half the price $4.95 compared to $9.95 for the larger size.

Find out more about the bookmarks and other new products, the Water Blessing Labels and specially offers at their website, The Spirit of Water.

More:

Dyer KA. 2009. Water Blessing Labels a Way to Help with Healing and Coping. Grief, Loss & Transitions Blog.
Dyer KA. 2009. Spirit of Water - Love is in the NICU. NICU Parent Support Blog.
Dyer KA. 2007. Water Blessing LabelsTurn Water (or Medicine) into Liquid Prayers. NICU Parent Support Blog.
Dyer KA. 2008. Water Blessing Labels. Squidoo.com

Image Source: The Spirit of Water Website.

Remembering on the 8th Anniversary of September 11, 2001

This year marks the 8th Anniversary of September 11, 2001. For some losses, such as this type of tragic loss, the grief remains. A quote from Senator Ted Kennedy written to a widow of 9/11, that was heard at his recent funeral, captures the nature of coping with tragic loss:

As you know so well, the passage of time never really heals the tragic memory of such a great loss, but we carry on, because we have to, because our loved one would want us to, and because there is still light to guide us in the world from the love they gave us.

Now 8 years later, we stop to remember those who died, in different ways around the country. This video clip from WPRI.com News shows some of the many ways that September 11th is being remembered in the United States and around the world.




From WPRI.com" With familiar rituals of grief and a new purpose to honor those who rushed into danger to help, the nation marked eight years since the Sept. 11 terror attacks Friday, with volunteers reading the names of the World Trade Center lost.

- Remembering 9/11 -

Ways of Remembering
If you can't make it to New York to celebrate, there are other ways that you can remember and honor the memory of those lost online:

• Wear Red on 9-11 - A grass roots effort to encouraging people to wear read on September 11 to show your support to those who lost their lives in the terrorist attacks of 2001. People on Twitter and Facebook can also participate in special ways.

• 911 Day of Service- My Good Deed has been working since 2002 to get September 11 established as a National Day of Service, to honor the victims and those who rose to service in response to the attacks on America. This is the first official year of celebrating 911 as a day of service.

For more suggestions and ways of coping, you can read the blog post that from last year on What is an Anniversary Response or Anniversary Reaction?

More Resources
Dyer KA. 2009. Coping with Grief on the Anniversary of September 11, 2001. Coping with Grief Group. The Circle.
Dyer KA. 2008. What is an Anniversary Response or Anniversary Reaction? Grief, Loss & Transitions Blog.
Dyer KA. 2007. Anniversary Reaction - When Remembering Isn't Always a Happy Occasion. Squidoo.com

Image: Roderick Yang. Ground Zero. Royalty Free Use.

Senator Kennedy's Gift of Time: Dying on His Own Terms

When I heard that Senator Kennedy had died, one of my first thoughts was that he had been able to die on his terms. He announced in May 2008 that he had a malignant brain tumor. When he died on August 26th this year, he had lived over a year with his cancer diagnosis.

Ironically, Senator Kennedy outlived three brothers, four sisters and three nephews. His tribute to nephew John Kennedy Jr after his fatal plane crash was such a moving reflection on time and the years one is given to live.

His time, which was not doubled, but cut in half, will live forever in our memory...
But like his father, he had every gift but length of years.

A Gift of Time
He was given the time to say good by to family, friends and colleagues. He was given time to be honored for a lifetime of public service, receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. He was given the time to even plan and orchestrate his memorial and funeral services. President Obama also spoke of this gift of time in his eulogy for Senator Kennedy:

He was given the gift of time that his brothers were not, and he used that gift to touch as many lives and right as many wrongs as the years would allow.

The Final Year
In her interview with Maria Shriver spoke about her uncle's final year as a beautiful blessing. He lived to experience the love and the gratitude of his family and his colleagues, something that his brothers had not done.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The Gift of Time given to Senator Kennedy allowed him to experience death on his own terms, to say good bye, to receive love from others and to have a say in how his final days would be spent.

This is the type of desired outcome that most practitioners of end-of-life care wish for their patients, the chance to experience the Gift of Time.

---

Update September 11, 2009
CNN.com reported today that Senator Kennedy began planning his funeral in 2007, long before his brain tumor. According to the article, Senator Kennedy had informed fellow members of the Massachusetts congressional delegation in 2007 that he had been working on his memorial plans and reflecting on his legacy, most notably that of Health Care.

In addition, as I'd suspected, an unnamed source in the article told CNN that the senator had focused on specific arrangements of his funeral and memorial service in the months leading up to his death.

Source: CNN.com. September 11, 2009. Kennedy began planning funeral before brain tumor

Motherland the Film - A Tribute to Those Coping with Grief

Motherland the Film is an amazing look at six women's journey of healing following the loss of a child by reaching out to help others half a world away.

Film-maker and director Jennifer Steinman documents a 17-day trip to South Africa of six grieving women from different parts of the United States to visit what Stephen Lewis, UN envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, refers to as "an entire continent in mourning."

As noted in the Movie's home page,

Unexpectedly and eight thousand miles from home, each finds comfort and healing in a landscape that appears, at first, to offer little more than melancholy.

You can also listen to an interview with director Jennifer Steinman about the making of the film:



This film really speaks to the healing power of volunteerism and also of the benefits of grieving in a community.

Awards for the Film
"Motherland" was the winner of the 2009 Emerging Visions Audience Award at the South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival. Its other awards include the Jury Prize for Best Feature at the 2009 Sebastopol Documentary Film Festival and Best Documentary at the 2009 California Independent Film Festival.

Opening Online - August 26, 2009
You can watch Motherland the Film when it premieres online August 26, 2009 on Gigantic Digital for the amazingly low price of $2.99 for a three day access pass. Visit Gigantic Digital to find out more about accessing this inspirational film.

Gone Too Soon - Michael Jackson's Prophetic Song

I thought I knew most of the great songs for dealing with loss, but this one, "Gone Too Soon" written by Michael Jackson came out while I was in Medical School and didn't get much air play, so was one that I missed.

The song has been going through my head since I heard Usher sing it at the memorial services. The song is a beautiful message of sadness and sorrow over the loss of a friend, but more so as a prophetic message of Michael Jackson's own passing.

Like A Comet
Blazing 'Cross The Evening Sky
Gone Too Soon

Like A Rainbow
Fading In The Twinkling Of An Eye
Gone Too Soon

Born To Amuse, To Inspire,
To Delight
Here One Day
Gone One Night

"Gone Too Soon" is a song written by Michael Jackson as a Musical Memorial Tribute for his friend Ryan White, a young boy at the center of the AIDS epidemic in the late 1980's. Ryan was a hemophiliac who contracted the disease from blood transfusions, before the blood supply was screened.

You can watch a live performance of the song by Michael Jackson below from President Clinton's 1992 Inaugural Ball.



Knowing Life Might End Too Soon
Sometimes people have a sense of their own mortality. Working with younger hospice patients in particular, one gets a sense that they know they are dying.

According to Lisa Marie Presley, Michael Jackson's wife, he may have had a sense, a knowing that he would die young, like her father (Elvis Presley) had. Soon after his death she posted on her MySpace Page, Michael had told her:

"I am afraid that I am going to end up like him (Elvis), the way he did."

I promptly tried to deter him from the idea, at which point he just shrugged his shoulders and nodded almost matter of fact as if to let me know, he knew what he knew and that was kind of that.

Their conversation would have occurred several years after "Gone Too Soon" was recorded and released.

Passing the Torch
This poignant, prophetic nature of this song also reminds me of a quote that seems to apply by George Bernard Shaw:

Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.

Michael Jackson now joins the rankings of Princess Diana, John Lennon, John F. Kennedy Jr., Steve Irwin, John Denver and John Kennedy and so many others who shone brightly as possible but passed that torch on much too soon.

P.S.
This blog post was the inspiration to create a tribute lens on Squidoo for all of those, famous and not so famous who have Gone Too Soon.

Image Source: NASA. Comets. Planetary Systems Library. Government Document.

Smile - A Beautiful Heartfelt Musical Memorial

It was only fitting at the Michael Jackson memorial service that was a celebration of his life ceremony that there were so many moving musical tributes. This service was a event shared around the world, a moment when the world stopped to grieve, to breathe and to remember together.

One of the more touching moment for me came first with Brooke Shields reminiscences that Michael Jackson's favorite song was "Smile" by Charlie Chaplin. His brother Jermaine took the stage with his version of "Smile."



"Smile" has been one of my favorite songs, a song that helps people cope with death and loss. The words of "Smile" offer hope as a way of making it though on those tough days.

Smile though your heart is aching;
Smile even though it's breaking.

That's the time you must keep on trying,
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smile.

Smile is a good song to remember and to listen to on days when the world seems to b e filled with sadness, like this day when we said good by to the person being called "the greatest entertainer that has ever lived."

More
Dyer K. Smile Though Your Heart is Aching. Squidoo.
Dyer K. 2007. Life is still worthwhile if you just smile - An Inspirational Song by Josh Groban. Grief, Loss and Transitions Blog.

Pocket Cemetery Inspired by Recent Celebrity Deaths

The pre-release of the new iPhone app, Pocket Cemetery has been inspired by the recent series of celebrity deaths, most notably Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Ed McMahon and Billy Mays.

Remembering Michael Jackson


Remembering Farrah Fawcett and Billy Mays


About Pocket Cemetery

According to their Website Pocket Cemetery is the first iPhone application that allows users to create virtual memorials for departed loved ones using customizable tombstones with pictures, bios and favorite memories. Users can easily create personalized plots for dead relatives, friends, pets, celebrities or anyone they want to memorialize. Aside from creating memorials, Pocket Cemetery also allows users to place virtual flowers on graves along with sending personal prayers and messages to dead loved ones.

Debating the Merits of Pocket Cemetery

Technology people are twittering and debating the merits of an application like Pocket Cemetery. Many feel it is exploiting those who have experienced a loss. With an introductory price of $1.99 and the regular price of $2.99, it seems like a very small price to pay for an application that could be very beneficial in helping someone cope with a loss.

Share Your thoughts on Pocket Cemetery

You can share your thoughts on Pocket Cemetery on the Pocket Cemetery page or by Tweeting your thoughts on Twitter with the hashcode #iGrief.

I am curious to know what some of the other people in the fields of grief, loss, bereavement and death and dying think about using new technologies to help those grieving a loss.

More:

Dyer K. 2009. Pocket Cemetery: A Way to Carry Departed Loved Ones in a Pocket. Squidoo.com.

Press Release. 2009. New iPhone App Memorializes Dead Loved Ones In The Palm Of Your Hand. PRWeb.