recycled essay for Morticians/Funeral Directors that might be reading this blog

When people ask you, “How can you do what you do?” what do you tell them? If you say, “Well, someone has to do it”

PLEASE QUIT NOW. GO SELL CARS.

If you do not think that you are the luckiest human on earth to be given the privilege of caring for the bereaved and their dead then I am not sure the industry needs you any longer.

When someone asks you, “Doesn’t this job get you down? Are you depressed all of the time” and you reply, “No, nothing really bothers me anymore”

GET OUT OF THE BUSINESS, YOU ARE NO GOOD TO US ANY MORE. LEARN TO CUT HAIR.

This job absolutely has to weigh you down on a day to day basis. We need to cry when funerals touch our hearts. That is how we know that we are still caring. When I go to someone’s home at 3:30 AM and I meet a person that is so lost in terror and grief because their loved one has just died. My heart BETTER go out to them. When I get that same person into the arrangement room the next day and we begin the process of creating a meaningful experience for them to take part in, and I notice a glimmer of hope in their eye, I BETTER realize that what I am doing is important. When I suggest that we fill the funeral home with paintings the deceased created and have ourselves an “art show” during the visitation and the funeral, and the survivors eyes light up and there is the beginning of a smile and they say, “You can do that?” I BETTER understand that I should be honored to take part in this experience. Finally, when we get to the graveside, and the services have concluded, and I am handing over the “pouch” with all of the cards and thank you notes inside, and the survivor, with tears of hope and joy in their eyes, embraces me in a hug or handshake and says, “Thank you, for all that you do” I know what I have done is good and nothing can make me feel much better than that.
If you are working as a funeral director/mortician to pay the bills, you are not in it for the right reasons, you should find something else to do. I guess the real question here is where is the meaning in your life? Why do you do ANYTHING you do? If you are plodding through your career simply to put food on the table for your family, you not only owe your family more than that, you owe yourself more than that. If there is one thing we better have figured out in this dismal trade is that pianos do fall from the sky all of the time. Why then would we do something that we do not absolutely think is the most amazing thing that we could possibly do?
I believe that the two most important events in a human beings existence are being part of a birth and taking part in a death. Neither of these events can be explained or understood by those that are actually partaking in them, they are experienced by the people who are affected by them. These are the most important times of any humans life. We should feel blessed, honored and proud to be able to be lucky enough to be a part of these experiences. We have a privileged duty that has been bestowed upon us, and that makes us very special. Let us never forget that. If you have forgotten that, or, you never believed it, get out.