Befriending death

And taming our monsters

Is it possible to make friends with death?

Typically, we dread our death or fear it.

Some of us are brave enough to face mortality and prepare for death. Others prefer to ignore it.

There are many ways to react to our mortality. But why would we choose to “befriend” it?

What would that look like?

I first heard the term from Henri Nouwen, a Dutch priest and theologian, a prolific writer, and a caring and enthusiastic teacher.

While I was enrolled in one of his classes at Yale Divinity School, Henri welcomed his parents for a visit.

His mother arrived feeling tired and listless. A physician discovered a tumor, and the elder Nouwens cut their visit short to return to Holland for her surgery.

The operation uncovered widespread cancer, and she died six days later from a complication.

Henri joined the family at her bedside for those last days and officiated at the funeral before returning to his teaching duties.

But he also began writing about his mother’s death. His reflections were later published as two small books, “In Memoriam” and “A Letter of Consolation,” written to his father.

Both are aching examinations of the hard road of grief, especially the grief of losing a beloved parent.

“We are asking about death,” he wrote to his father, “mother’s and our own, not because we are dying, but because we feel strong enough to raise the questions about our most basic human infirmity…”

His mourning had shown him how easily we humans evade the question of death and how important it is for us to face it.

“I think,” he wrote, “that our first task is to befriend death. I like that expression, ‘befriend.’”

He explained that he first heard the expression from James Stillman, a Jungian analyst:

“[Stillman] emphasized the importance of ‘befriending’: befriending your dreams, befriending your shadow, befriending your unconscious. He made it convincingly clear that in order to become full human beings, we have to claim the totality of our experience; we come to maturity by integrating not only the light but also the dark side of our story into our selfhood…

“…So many of our doubts and hesitations … are bound up with our deep-seated fear of death that our lives would be significantly different if we could relate to death as a familiar guest instead of a threatening stranger.”

Wise words. But how do we do this? How do we make friends with death?

Maybe we can take a cue from children.

Several years ago, I had a chance to visit with friends and meet their 3-year-old daughter for the first time.

She made a late entrance at the afternoon gathering, proudly announcing she had just finished her nap.

“Did you dream?” I asked.

“Yes!” she said, as if that answer should be obvious even to an adult.

“What did you dream about?”

“Monsters!” she exclaimed, before traipsing away to find someone with more interesting questions. Doesn’t everyone dream of monsters?

It’s not uncommon for young children inhabiting small bodies to encounter big “monsters” in their dreams.

After all, their waking hours are filled with tall adults and big challenges, like learning to walk, talk, run, explore, and make friends.

With the security of clear boundaries, they soon find that those early dream monsters aren’t so big or scary after all.

But some monsters don’t go away as we grow up. We just try to hide them.

And is there a bigger one than death?

Therapist Lori Gottlieb offers a helpful metaphor to illustrate healthy boundaries:

“Children get lost in an ocean, stunted in a fish bowl, and flourish in an aquarium.”

That feels right to me.

My young friend was fortunate to grow up in a safe aquarium. She seemed to know already that the monsters in her dreams were not there to terrify her.

More likely, they were inviting her to explore challenges that can seem daunting at any age — the need to try new things, to fall and get back up, to fail and start over, to stretch, grow, and conquer fears.

With love, support, and boundaries — a good aquarium — most children accept that challenge.

What about us grown-ups?

Can we face the monster in our dreams? Can we befriend our mortality?

Or do we let it keep us in a fishbowl?

If we choose to befriend it, death can illuminate the boundaries that mark our time on Earth, the aquarium where we have a chance to flourish.