Watch above: It’s a growing trend … more and more people are opting out of the traditional funeral and planning their own end of life celebrations. Meaghan Craig talks to one man who isn’t clowning around when it comes to his final farewell.
SASKATOON – Life celebrations. They are growing in popularity as more people choose to embrace something a little different, something that captures the essence of a person both in life and death.
That’s where Lisa Greig comes in, as she brings life to death one celebration at a time.
“A lot of people are saying, ‘I want to celebrate my life. We celebrate the birth of a baby, we’re celebrating our weddings, why aren’t we celebrating our lives after we’ve died?’,” said Greig, a registered social worker and owner of Silver Lining Events.
For the last year, Grieg has been helping people achieve just that.
“We need to celebrate their life and of course we’re mourning and we’re grieving and it’s very sad and that doesn’t take away from the person though,” added Greig.
“I want to really work to honour and celebrate that person and who they are, what they did and the things that we loved about them.”
READ MORE: Calgary-based funeral home offers unique celebrations
Rob Loewen, 66, said he’s seriously considering a life celebration of his own instead of a traditional funeral.
“For those people who want that I think there’s a tremendous service there, it’s just not who I am,” said Loewen.
“I’m a less formal kinda person and I’m more interested in thinking about relationships rather than rituals so that would be my attraction to doing something other than the traditional funeral.”
In fact, Loewen was a clown for more than three decades and says despite having multiple sclerosis, his health is great.
Still, he’s been in touch with Grieg but hasn’t developed a plan for his life celebration just yet.
“I think they should all learn to juggle and ride a unicycle at my celebration in honour of me,” said Loewen.
“I think just having that conversation and allowing us to explore what are wishes are so important and completely invaluable in doing that,” added Grieg
Greig, who has her masters in social work, says she has a “passion in death, dying and grief” and knows the type of closure families get from life celebrations.
“I think that so often we shove death into the darkness and into the corner and we just shy away from it, we avoid it, we don’t want to talk about it and we think that it should be something that we just don’t talk about.”
She also says far too often families get caught up in what they “think they’re supposed” to do to honour their loved one as opposed to what they’d really like to do.
“If anything through my business I want to provide families and individuals with the opportunities and permission to … this is your life, let’s do what you want to do and if you want a party, let’s throw a party.”
At this point, her company Silver Linings Events offers, but is not limited to: celebrations after death, life celebrations for terminally ill patients, memorials and life celebrations for the very young.
“The boundaries are limitless and that goes to lives as well so whether we’re celebrating the life of an 88-year-old man or woman or whether it’s the stillborn child I think that every life should be honoured and celebrated.”
As far as the cost, Grieg says that’s determined on a case by case basis and depends on what aspects the families want to do themselves.
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