This audio retreat with Joan Halifax is designed to help us all become contemplative caregivers for those about to pass through the gateway of death. The author brings over 25 years of experience as an anthropologist, a health care professional, a student of shamanic teachers, and a Buddhist lay priest to bear on this important rite of passage.
Halifax presents many of the techniques she uses in her Santa Fe-based Project on Being with Dying including mindfulness meditations, insights from the latest near death research, the four basic principles of Native American council practice, the reverence of the eightfold Buddhist path, the importance of an engaged spirituality, and death meditations. All her work with dying AIDS patients has helped this caregiver to hone the spiritual practices of being present, attention, compassion, love, nurturing, openness, and silence. Halifax vividly conveys her respect for the wishes of the dying and her reverence for the awesome mystery of life. "Being with Dying" is a great gift to listeners by a woman whose unique talents have made her a wise teacher.