Taking the Risk

We decided to write personal feelings on death and the afterlife for our project and I told my group that I was very inexperienced with writing and that I didn't think I could produce anything worthwhile. I got some great encouragement from the group about just writing what I feel and just let it come out onto the paper. Once I decided that I wanted to write about how I wanted to be cremated not buried it all just seemed to come to me. It was very encouraging knowing that my group was helping me take a personal risk to create something that I was so unfamiliar with.
When we decided to use what I had written in the workshop in class I was very nervous because I am not used to reading my own thoughts to an audience. I am glad that my group pushed me to move out of my comfort zone to perform written work of my own. I thought back to what Tara had said about accepting risk and not being afraid to fail and realized that no matter what happens after I read the piece, I was going to learn something.
I am going to post the piece that I wrote as a reminder to myself to take the risk because the best lessons you can have come from failure.

Don’t Put Me in the Ground

 

When we die we are placed in an ornate coffin with plush interior, done up to the nines and dressed in our finest clothes.

 

That’s not for me.

 

The way I see it, I don’t want to spend the rest of eternity in a stuffy box dressed in clothes I wouldn’t have worn down the street today; rotting away.

 

That’s not for me.

 

When I die, don’t put me in the ground to socialize with the worms, to settle into darkness forever.

 

Don’t put me in a little box on your mantel, I don’t want to be decoration.

 

Instead take me to a quiet field, with wildflowers and weeping willows. Take me to a cliff overlooking a lush valley with shadowing greenery and overwhelming views.

 

Take me to the sandy beach where I can hear the crashing of waves and the smell of the salt.

 

Set me free and watch me dance in the happiness of my own freedom.

 

I want to experience riding on the wind, being the sunset, exploring the earth.

 

Come visit me and feel my spirit around you. Watch the sunset and cherish the times we used to spend together.

 

Don’t sit on the cold, hard ground above me and mourn. Don’t put flowers on my tombstone.

 

Don’t put me in the ground.