Facing Death in Tuesdays with Morrie, the author, Mitch Albom

“Once you learn how to die ,you learn how to live”,this quote sums up most of the lesion Morrie is trying to teach the readers. let me start from the beginning Mitch is telling us a story about his old professor that has been diagnosed with ALS.It's a disease when your body shuts down slowly . Morrie is teaching us how to live life in better ways before it's too late. The three most important aphorisms is family,importence,memories.

That’s the thing about death: it sneaks up and robs a person of their life, taking away all of their happiness. People indulge themselves in the idea of fearing death rather than facing it. Death is an unknown territory where no survivors have ever came back to share their experience. The US Army Private, Roy Scranton’s article “Learning How to Die in the Anthropocene” shines hope where he explains how fear can be conquered if the idea of dying is accepted. It is fear that paralyzes people from moving toward the idea of death. If people started to embrace the present, they will understand the inevitability of death and start discrediting fear.

The focus throughout Tuesdays with Morrie was on life. Many might see it as the story of death, but it is actually the story life. Morrie might talk a little on how he meets death, but what he is talking about is living at the end of his life. Mitch writes, “Now here we were . . . . . . Dying man talks to living man, tells him what he should know.”(Albom, 133) When a timer is placed on Morrie’s remaining days, he obtains a dying man’s perspective on what is truly important in life, and how to incorporate in life this importance. I looked for parts of the book that pertain directly to my life; I focused on this concept while reading this book. My thesis remained elusive. There wasn’t a Tuesday that jumped out at me, and then I came to the

To begin with, the first important aphorism that Morrie is “Once you learn how to die you learn how to live”. He was saying if they knew they’re going to die they would think and live differently. In fact, Morrie said “everyone knows they’re going to die ‘’ he said again but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently’’(125).

People die everyday all over the world. In United States, people use hundreds of different words to describe death. Generally, people that grow up in the United States tend to view death as a taboo subject and are seen as a topic that should be kept behind closed doors and contracted with an individual or family. A belief system that so many individuals hold to be true has been shaped over the past century. In this culture, death has become something that is enormously feared and as a result, some people stop living their lives to his or her highest potential because of their fear of dying. The effect that death has pertains to individuals of all ages, gender and ethnicities. But unfortunately, how death is viewed it has become more and

The common theme that I found throughout these three articles was our ability to handle the topic of death. People (at least I know I personally do this) tend to side step the topic of death. We use terms such as “passed away” or “aren’t with us anymore” in order to sugarcoat the true reality of the situation. “Die” to us just sounds so harsh and terrifying. Not only do we phrase death in certain ways, but we also tend to ignore the facts. Wolff talks about how we all know how we are going to end up: we all have subconsciously acknowledged that it is highly likely that we will end up in a hospital bed somewhere unable to remember our closest friends and family. However, we put this in the back of our mind and do not think about it. This is

At this part of the book Morrie is very sick, and close with the object of dying. He asks Mitch why the whole world is so afraid of dying, and tells him, “Once you learn how to die you learn how to live.” He says that the world is just walking around as if we are sleepwalking, and the only way someone could look at the world differently is realizing that they will die one day. The meaning is pretty obvious in what he says. “Once you learn that you are going to die, you will start to live life to the fullest.” Someone does not have to be in a situation where they might die soon in order to be able to live their life happily. I do not agree with this advice, and it does not connect to my life. This statement or aphorism is not something I agree with because someone can know how to live their life to the fullest if they are not dying. I know many people who are not close to death but are living life to the fullest and know that they live and love life sufficiently. I do not take my life for granted, and I am not very close with death. I do know that I will die someday, but that is not one of my main reasons that I feel that way about

Tuesdays with Morrie is a book about life. Morrie was a man who learned he had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), which is a disease that weakens muscles and impacts physical function. When he learned that he had this disease one of the major quotes that he told Mitch was “When you learn to die, you learn to live.” I think it means, when you learn that you’re going to die you realize some of the morales you had in life were wrong. For example many people believe that money can bring you happiness. But when you learn your dying you learn that money can’t make you happy, but being around the people you care about can. Tuesdays with Morrie has changed my life in many ways, here’s how.

The intent of this paper is to write about a class experience of the shadow of death, and reflect upon the readings, discussions and personal stories that have emotionally impressed me. Terms such as euthanasia, suicide and death rituals were discussed during the lectures in class leaving me with a sense of loss. The many beliefs and world vies, that may differ from the American culture, were considered, which I found to be enlightening. The examination of various concepts such as practicality, wisdom and humor were presented and illustrated in “Understanding dying, death, & bereavement” written by Leming and Dickinson (2011).

At his end Morrie came to the realization that death is natural and one should accept this and focus on the essentials, living as if this day was the last. He iterates this in his line “To know you’re going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time… that way you can actually be more involved in your life while you’re living” (Albom 81). Morrie believes that people lived today like they might die tomorrow people will care less about material things and by extent they should be less greedy and kinder. While I can agree with his logic as I follow it, I cannot accept that this would work in reality. This train of thought isn’t common for a reason. The only people I know of who think like Morrie Suggests are reckless people in stories. When I read enough of the Fourth Tuesday this idea made me stop to imagine life like this. Personally, it lead to a train of thought questioning the point of life. Try as I might I had no answer, let alone one as simple as 42. I later realized when writing this line that this is likely why we seem to avoid the topic of death as it brings up too many questions about life that people don’t have answers to. These questions can be dangerous to those with a less stable mindset. This is why I cannot support this chapter in the textbook of Morrie’s final

“Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live” (Albom 82). A quote by Morrie in the novel Tuesdays with Morrie. Morrie is a former teacher who is slowly dying of ALS or also know Lou Gehrig's disease. Its starts in your feet and slowly work up your body from your feet, weakening the muscle system till you no longer can move. Morrie knows that he is going to die so he makes the most of what he has left in his life by talking to a former student name Mitch Albom about different life lessons thought the book. He changes Mitch by making him learn how to love, making him see that material things are not a necessity and learns that you need to forgive people in life before it is too late.

The article, “Death and Dying in the Curriculum of Public School: Is there a place?”, written by Ethel L. King-McKenzie is contained within the book “Death Dying and Bereavement” composed of by its two main authors Dickinson’s, and Leming. Addresses the fear of death individuals have and how that fear is promoted in our youth by sheltering children from death. By implanting a curriculum surrounding death and dying, students can grow up to surpass disregarding older generations and overcome stigmas involving death. Not discussing death and allowing the dying process to be a part of our live negatively impacts our coping skills. Tools of which, are a salient aspect in life as every human will encounter death in their lives. In addition, the

Sogyal Rinpoche stated “When you start preparing for death you soon realize that you must look into your life now...and come to face the truth of yourself. Death is like a mirror in which the true meaning of life is reflected.” Death is imminent. Many people today fear death for various reasons. Some people are able to accept it, where others deny its existence. Some people spend their lives working towards the coming of their death, and their life thereafter, where others spend there lives doing everything they possibly can to make the most of their time on earth. In Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom, the lead character Morrie Schwartz was diagnosed with the fatal disease Lou Gerrig’s Disease, also know as ALS. Although many people

by an unforgiving disease, he doesn’t complain about his disability. Instead, he decides to portray

Within this novel, Morrie embraced his mortality with “love, acceptance and open communication” as he gave the reader a glimpse into what he considered to be “The Meaning of Life.” Using Mitch Albom as a vessel to pen his “own culture values,” Morrie was able to define the contradictions between others vision of “popular culture values” and his style of truly living through “life, death and reincarnation.” With the use of materials obtained from the course, this writer was able to summarize various observations about Morrie’s “final lecture” on life, death and family amidst his perceptual understanding that reorganized “aging as growth and not