Perfect Endings: A Conscious Approach to Dying and Death

by Robert Sachs

Book Overview

Written with lucidity and compassionate understanding, Perfect Endings shows how the death experience is an expansion into a wider dimension of our core being. As we move through our dying process, all the strength and wisdom we have gained in a lifetime is called forth. This is a time of quickening in which the final stages of living work themselves out as we step into our death and what lies beyond. No matter how it appears, it is, in fact, our finest hour--our perfect ending. Robert Sachs explains how he uses the Tibetan practice of phowa , or conscious dying, to aid this process in his own counseling practice. Written as a series of stories that allow us to be privy to the inner workings of the dying process of individuals with whom Sachs worked as a professional hospice counselor, each case illustrates a particular aspect of the transformative process that led each person to his or her own interior landscape. Journeying in tandem with these souls, Sachs presents different solutions to the task of letting go of life and provides valuable guidance for caregivers, family members, and those who are facing death themselves.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0892817798
• ISBN13: 9780892817795
• Release Date: April 1998
• Publisher: Healing Arts Press
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.3" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Perfect Endings are soul healing

With lucidity & compassion we are shown how the death experience is an expansion into a wider dimension of our being. As we move through our dying process, all the strength & wisdom we've gained in our lifetime is called forth. In a series of stories that give us glimpses into the inner workings of how we die, Robert Sachs, who works as a professional hospice counsellor, offers us a bouquet of transforming moments that led each person to their interior landscape. We are gifted the journeying in tandem with these souls & given different solutions to the task of letting go of life. Very helpful when our Poppa was passing on to his next Great Adventure.

A good guide for the end of life

Sachs is a hospice social worker who has counseled many people faced with death. The book comments on several cases he faced, the most moving account being that of his father's death. In Sachs's long story of his client "Michael"'s dying process, he provides guidelines for approaching death that are worth personal investigation. He gives a good sense of what it must be like at the end. Sachs talks about rituals in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying (chanting, breathing, focus) that ease the passage into the final moment on earth. I have thought very little about death, refused to be present at my parents' deaths, and generally avoided it all. This book has motivated me to find out more about dying and to plan how I will meet my own death if I am granted the privilege of knowing I will die within a certain period of time. It has also made me an advocate of death and dying education for all of us.