Benet Waterman: My experience of being a Celebrant

Tue, 14 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000

As a Funeral Celebrant, I carry with me a constant and very deep sense of privilege when I am invited to view, through an opened window, someone else’s life experiences.

I am awed, each and every time, by the wonder of the story shared and in discovering, through that, what has been given to others in the living of that life.

I am moved, too, in a profound way on those thankfully fewer occasions when there is no-one present, able, or even willing, to step up and speak for the one who has passed.

‘No man is an island’ – we are all one – and the unspoken invitation always, of course, is to look within.

Through recent months I have shared in the wait for death of someone I grew to love very much as a friend, a woman I respected greatly.

In planning for her transition she also gifted her home to close friend, fellow-spiritual teacher and soul midwife P.

K’s spirit soared in the loosening from earthly ties that can otherwise bind – powerfully excited and filled with eager anticipation of the next stage in her soul’s journey.

How wonderful to be included – and how moving to see the many different faces of the woman we had all loved conjured up for everyone there through the words we each put into our tributes.

What a privilege, too, to witness her facing her death with such dignity, graciousness, and compassion both for herself and for others.

Much of the spiritual understanding that K.
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I would like to express my sincere appreciation to Kirtana for permission so graciously given to quote the lyrics of her song 'Who you really are’.

‘Who you really are’

We measure success by the things we accrue

or the bonds that we form, or the deeds that we do.

But these too shall pass, as hard as we try to hold on to form; form will die.

But inherent in this dance of form

Is the chance to see what’s yet unborn,

And the choice to throw this chance away

And be caught up in the play of who we think we are,

who we think we are.

and as Kirtana continues ….

This is your lifetime; it could end at anytime.

Where is your attention?

Where is your prayer?

Where is your song?

In a fortunate life, comes a call to be free

From the cycle of bondage and mis-identity,

to wake from the dream and finally realise the truth of

one’s being before the body dies.

So before the final scene is past,

see the screen on which it’s cast.

See what’s seeing this me and you.

And then you will see who…

who you really are, who you really are

Who you really

who we really are.

Could there be more to this life we call “mine” than a journey through space or a storyline?

Does who we are begin with breath, depend on form or end with death?

And who you really are, Who you really are.

Benet is a qualified Soul-midwife and Independent Funeral Celebrant living and working in the Border City of Carlisle.

This article was originally published in More to Death, the official magazine to The Natural Death Centre.