I held a funeral for myself ⚰️💀🪦

Badwater, Death Valley National Park

Flashback to December 2020. I was in the midst of a major life transition. I had just quit my NGO job, barreling headfirst into the unknown.

Yet I felt that I couldn’t make the transition if I didn’t somehow honour and grieve the “Mariana” who had gotten me to that point. That Mariana busted her ass for years to survive, made it through the academic rigours of UC Berkeley, moved to the other side of the world and worked hard for everything she had. And most importantly of all, she learned to befriend all her demons and make peace with her mind, healing years of anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation.

And it was time to put her to rest.

“Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but…life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.” - Gabriel Garcia Marques

The funeral ritual itself was simple. My then partner and I visited a Berlin forest on the 2020 Winter Solstice to hold the event. I wrote and read a eulogy for myself, burning it when finished along with a few photos and journal pages that I felt represented this old version of myself.

There wasn’t an immediate epiphany or big release. It was instead subtle. And although I wouldn’t feel the impact of the ritual for weeks, if not months, it was a profound experience that helped clear my path.

We don’t have many formal rituals in our culture to commemorate major life transitions. Sure, we have birthdays, graduations and weddings, but not much else. We don’t really ritualise or celebrate major life events like divorce or breaking up with someone, quitting jobs, becoming an adult, becoming a parent (or not!), starting a business, or simply outgrowing our former selves. But I think we should.

Every life transition is, in a way, one of the many times we die in our lifetime.

As Gabriel Garcia Marques said, “Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but…life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.”

Would you every hold a funeral for yourself while you’re alive? Why or why not?