"We make something normal, we call it a problem, we pathologize it, and then we go to war with it. Sometimes that works pretty well, and oftentimes it works not at all. In the case with end of life and death, its a mix. Medical science and our understanding of health has advanced, and we are able to live longer, and we have pushed back on nature in all sorts of ways that Im happy for…But the bad news is we just keep orphaning this subject of death, and it becomes less and less familiar and then more and more surprising and gets harder and harder than it needs to be."
Bruce L. Miller Jr. is an American physician, author, and speaker. He is a practicing hospice and palliative medicine physician and is best known for his 2015 TED Talk, "What Really Matters at the End of Life". Miller has been on the teaching faculty at UCSF School of Medicine since 2007. He sees patients and caregivers through his online palliative care service, Mettle Health.
"Leaning into the subject of suffering, leaning into the subject of mortality, was directly therapeutic for me. It wasn’t an intellectual interest or a recreational thought...Getting through my day required me to lean into it, and that’s where I just saw all this beauty that comes from it."
"People think youre Jesus because youve gone through something special. They treat you like youve got special knowledge, or they treat you a little bit like Frankenstein. Of course, those two responses are related. Neither of them is accurate. But thats the kind of vibe you can get — a lot of us who have disabilities know very well."
"By facing mortality, it seems to inform how you live. So, the secret is that facing death has a lot to do with living well…"
"You can always find a shock of beauty or meaning in what life you have left."