This course invites participants to explore death as a way to live more fully, with clarity, presence, and intention.
We’ll reflect on what matters most, what remains unresolved, and how to meet the time we have left. Through writing, discussion, and weekly reading, we’ll examine impermanence not as a threat, but as a teacher. The course will culminate in a personal reflection project and shared closing ritual.
Students are encouraged to read a book from the instructor's recommended list, and to share what they've read.
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Instructor: Laurie Farrington
Laurie Farrington considers herself a facilitator for this course, not as a teacher or expert. Her interest in death and dying began more than fifty years ago, when she first read Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s On Death and Dying. Since then, she has continued to study the subject from both spiritual and practical perspectives. From 2012 to 2014, she participated in two year-long programs through the Shambhala Center in Burlington, Vermont, based on Stephen Levine’s A Year to Live, first as a participant and then as a facilitator. This course is not a support group, nor a space for dramatizing or sentimentalizing death. It is a structured and serious invitation to reflect, clarify, and prepare, quietly and personally, with others who are doing the same. Her role for this class is to offer structure, ask honest questions, and create a steady space where participants can engage the material with depth and respect.
Image credit: J. M. W. Turner, Dunwich, Suffolk, ca. 1827
