~ here it is.  Most of us are familiar with thinking of ourselves as a combination of body and spirit.  I would like to suggest that there is a third element; something distinct, yet interconnected, which might be called 'personality energy'; which is perhaps most noticeable during active dying.   This isn't about mental or psychological energy per se, though they contribute to it.  Rather, this personality energy encompasses our deeply personal stance towards living and deathing~ including our fears, hopes, and core attitudes.

The concept is this: as one transitions in active dying, their personality energy does not vanish (no energy can just vanish).  Instead, it radiates into the environment around them.  If they approach deathing in fear or regret, that energy is released and affects those in their environment.   Conversely, a death met with acceptance and contentment can emit a positive energy, potentially affecting others.  This perspective suggests that striving to cultivate conscious positivity in our culture's approach to deathing could -- in an individual's deathing process -- not only affect their experience, but also impact the psychological landscape of those around them.

To illustrate, imagine we could quantify this personality energy.   If a person's attitude towards death is 51% negative, and they are surrounded by positive energy released in an active dying, that negativity could decrease to 49%.   Likewise, if they have a 51% positive outlook and experience more positive energy around them, it could increase to 53%.   While these numbers are symbolic, they suggest that the collective positivity of individuals towards deathing might gradually shift our cultural attitude towards a more positive approach to the whole process of death.

Is there concrete evidence for such a release of personality energy into the environment?  No -- not beyond the normal psychological influence that is naturally experienced when being exposed to a positive approach in another's deathing. 

However, I have noticed that, in several deathings that I have attended, there is a very easily identifiable energy radiating out of the body -- felt as heat, and sometimes too hot to touch!  Most often, this energetic release comes from the hands and feet -- although I have also experienced it as doing likewise from the top of the head -- as if a personal essence is being released.  Is it possible that this 'flooding' is personality energy being released into the environment, and not merely a 'thought experiment'?

•  CINDEA has begun to use the term 'deathing', instead of 'death and dying' (a term in which the words are chronologically backwards!), to indicate that the process IS a process, not a moment in time: it reframes dying as an extended journey, rather than a singular event.   It begins when one considers their own morality (perhaps in relation to the quality of another's deathing), or while doing their advance-care-planning, through terminal diagnosis (or frailty equivalent) and active dying, the actual moment of death, and even beyond if one believes in some form of 'after-life existence'.   It also includes the fact that the out-livers (a more factual term for 'survivors') continue to experience that deathing in the form of grief.
  
  This understanding of deathing as a continuum encourages us to think of life and death not as nouns/moments, but as verbs/processes; and not as separate, but as part of a wholistic journey -- one that we navigate not just in the final days, but across our lifetime.

November 7, 2024 -- Pashta MaryMoon By My Heart and Hand teacher