Images of the Dying: A Podcast with Wendy MacNaughton, Lingsheng Li, and Frank Ostaseski

Can death be portrayed as beautiful?

In this episode, we share the joy of talking with Wendy MacNaughton (artist, author, graphic journalist) and Frank Ostaseski (Buddhist teacher, author, founder of the Metta Institute and Zen Hospice Project) about using drawings and images as tools for creating human connections and processing death and dying.

You may know Wendy as the talented artist behind Meanwhile in San Francisco or Salt Fat Acid Heat. Our focus today, however, was on her most recently published book titled How to Say Goodbye. This beautiful book began as a very personal project for Wendy while she was the artist-in-residence at Zen Hospice. As BJ MIller writes in the foreword, “May this book be a portal -- a way for us to move beyond the unwise territory of trying to ‘do it right’ and into the transcendent terrain of noticing what we can notice, loving who we love, and letting death -- like life --surprise us with its ineffable beauty.”

Some highlights from our conversation:  

• The role of art in humanizing the dying process. 

• How the act of drawing can help us sloooow down, pay attention to the people and world around us, and ultimately let go… 

• The possibility of incorporating drawings in research and even clinical care. 

• The wisdom and experiences of hospice caregivers (who are often underpaid and undervalued).

• How to use the “Five Things” as a framework for a “conversation of love, respect, and closure” with someone who is dying.

And finally, Wendy offers a drawing lesson and ONE-MINUTE drawing assignment to help us (and our listeners) be more present and connect with one another. You can read more about this blind contour exercise from Wendy’s DrawTogether Strangers project. The rules are really quite simple: 

• Find another person.

• Sit down and draw each other for only one minute.

• NEVER lift up your pen/pencil (draw with a continuous line) 

• NEVER look down at your paper

That’s it! While the creative process is what truly matters, we think that the outcome is guaranteed to be awesome and definitely worth sharing. We invite you to post your drawings on twitter and tag us @GeriPalBlog!

Happy listening and drawing,

Lingsheng @lingshengli 

Additional info: 

• For weekly lessons on drawing and the art of paying attention from Wendy, you can subscribe to her Substack DrawTogether with WendyMac and join the Grown-Ups Table (GUT)! 

• To learn more about Frank’s teaching and philosophy on end-of-life care, read his book The Five Invitations 

This episode of the GeriPal Podcast is sponsored by UCSF’s Division of Palliative Medicine, an amazing group doing world-class palliative care.  They are looking to build on both their research and clinical programs and are interviewing candidates for the Associate Chief of Research&