Individually and collectively, we can and must imagine a more enlightened, loving way to care for our grandparents, our parents, our brothers and sisters, and even our children in their dying. By demonstrating that care in practice, we enlist the imagination of others, heightening their own expectations. Imagination is key, because the crisis of terminal care has so many sources and so many manifestations that a piecemeal, mechanistic approach could never be enough. Only imagination, working on the level of shared values and expectations, has the power to effect the required cultural transformation.
— Ira Byock, Dying Well