Death—it is the most human experience and yet the topic humans run away from at every opportunity. Why is this? What if we reimagined what death means to each of us personally and collectively as a society?

Columbia University physician Dr. L.S. Dugdale sets out to answer these questions and change the approach to death in her new book, The Lost Art of Dying. Dr. Dugdale’s long career in medicine has forced her to become intimate with death in a way very few are, as she is often tasked with guiding her patients through their final phase. Her unique position has gifted her with a new perspective on death that she now hopes to share with the world. She says death is something that we as a culture should celebrate, not be frightened of—but in order to die well, we must first live well. By recovering our sense of finitude, confronting our fears, accepting how our bodies age, and involving our communities in end-of-life care, we can discover what it means to both live and die well.

Join us for an honest and soulful conversation with Dr. Dugdale as we run toward the topic of death—freeing ourselves from the fear of the finite.

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Dugdale photo by Julia Hembree Smith