Say Hello to Your New Best Friend!

In Making Friends with Death, Laura Pritchett guides you through coming to terms with your inevitable date with the Grim Reaper.

PRAISE FOR MAKING FRIENDS WITH DEATH

“[Pritchett] shares a veritable cornucopia of personal experiences, strategies, perspectives, and workshop-like exercises to demystify, intelligently prepare for, and gracefully manage this most daunting of all of life’s challenges—our passing. Written in an accessible style fused with warmth, humor, and wisdom, it should be on everyone’s got-to-read list and part of every clinician’s library."

 — Russell Grieger, Ph.D., author of The Couples Therapy Companion and Unrelenting Drive

“… an intricate road map for the exploration of our death so that we can get on with the business of joyful living.  This book is truly a gift to humanity.”

—Dr. Tim Flynn, physical therapist and international expert in chronic pain management

"While I’ve read my fair share of advice and research on dying, sat with dying patients, and experienced my own mortality at a young age, nothing could’ve prepared me for this book. The emotions surrounding death—from catapulting hope to bottoming out grief—are captured in such a succinct and artful way that is at once both fearfully honest and, dare I say, entertaining. Laura Pritchett has assembled a true workbook for the one course none of us want to take. Astonishingly, I feel I may have been given the key to a good death."

— Laura Katers, physician assistant, Inpatient Pain Management, University of Washington Medical Center

This book will be of interest to:

In this light-hearted, irreverent exploration of the one thing that is certain in all lives, Making Friends with Death offers a look at all the uncertainty that precedes this final act. A compelling mix of practical how-to advice and personal narrative, this book encapsulates our greatest quest—to make peace with death. Pritchett offers up wisdoms she has gleaned from all sorts of places, including a decade of traditional research and a lifetime of other related, but less formal, pursuits (digging up a dead body, watching her dog be necropsied on the lawn, hosting Death Cafés, and confronting the grim reaper himself).

Making Friends with Death broaches the sacred and the scary with warmth, research, and humor. Interspersed with a variety of workbook-like exercises, this book will prove to be the go-to companion for anyone who would rather be able to greet death as an old friend, rather than a spooky stranger. 

MAKING FRIENDS WITH DEATH: A FIELD GUIDE FOR YOUR IMPENDING LAST BREATH (TO BE READ, IDEALLY, BEFORE IT'S IMMINENT!)

By Laura Pritchett

Self-Help/Death, Grief, Bereavement/Self-Management| Trade Paperback Original | 268 pages

Viva Editions | September 2017 | $16.95 | 9781632280596

About the Author: Laura Pritchett is the author of five novels and the recipient of the PEN USA Award, the Milkweed National Fiction Prize, the High Plains Book Award, the Willa Award, and others. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, O Magazine, Salon, High Country News, The Millions, Publisher’s Weekly, The Sun, and many others. She holds a PhD from Purdue University and teaches around the country. You can find out more at https://www.makingfriendswithdeath.com

I am a documentary film maker who has produced an award winning feature documentary film about a true UFO event from 1975. The Travis Walton story was fictionalized in the successfull 1993 Paramount Pictures film called "Fire in the Sky". The true story had never been shared in a documnetary film befor now. The film has been well recieved at main stream film festivals winning over 29 award laurels in the past year and a half. Travis Walton himself has been making numerouse appearances at confernces and for special interest groups disucussing the film and his role in helping to produce the film with Jennifer W Stein. There is additional informaiton on line about thie film at TravisWaltonTheMovie.com. For aditional informaiotn about Jennifer W Stein visit: onwingesproductions.com and MainLineMufon.com

Jennifer W. Stein is a self-taught filmmaker who never went to film school. She is an entrepreneur who started making films in the 1990’s while running non-profit organizations, raising her two children, and running a special events business.

Harnessing the power of the moving visual image to educate, inspire and empower, Jennifer uses film to help achieve her goals: to further important causes, and help open peoples awareness to important issues. Jennifer has strong interests in the UFO phenomena, crop circles & ancient archaeology. The result is a powerful combination of community leadership and purposeful filmmaking. Jennifer likes to collaborate with other filmmakers and learns from all of them.

Jennifer unique ability capturing personal stories that are less likely to be accurately covered by mainstream media. 

Jennifer film web site is Onwinges Productions provides a sampling of her past productions and award winning documentary films. Jennifer has won for Open Minds IUFOC EBE awards for productions she has done in the last 5 years. These were for “The Disclosure Dialogues” she produced with filmmaker Ron James in 2011, and he most recent project “Travis – The True Story of Travis Walton”.

This film 90-minute documentary recounts the now world- famous 1975 UFO abduction of Travis Walton and the impact this event had on many people’s lives including Travis. You can view the trailer.

The film has won 29 mainstream film festival awards. The film was four years in the making. All living members of the original logging crew are featured. Current and archived of the police sheriff, the chief polygraph expert for Arizona in 1975, as well as UFO experts Stanton Friedman, Kathy Marden, Ben Hansen, James Fox, Peter Robbins, and Lee Spiegel, Leo Sprinkle, David Jacobs and Richard Dolan are woven together to tell the accurate true story like is has never been told before. The film uncovers the some of the unknown facts behind a 30 year unsuccessful debunking effort spearheaded by Phillip Klass.

Nov. 5, 2015 marked the 40th anniversary of the Travis Walton incident. Jennifer believed the time had come to capture these interviews and testimonies on film for the next generation.

Jennifer presents on her Crop Circles research and on her travels to many ancient sites like Puma Pukka Bolivia, Cuzco Peru, and Gobeklit Tepe, Turkey.

She is a state section director since 2002 for MUFON PA, and the founder of Main Lie MUFON, a public out reach and free educational programing on similar topics in her North west Philadelphia suburban community.

Dr Rick Hertless has been spreading the Good News of the Gospel for years. Through writing, speaking and singing he brings his audience a better understanding of an eternity with a loving Savior. It is his desire to spread the message of Christ around the world and give a picture of how a loving God wants his people to live.

Rick Hertless, pastor, evangelist, author and singer, spreads the Gospel around the world through radio, music, printed media and live messages as the Lord calls. He is a graduate of Liberty University and holds a Doctorate Degree specializing in ministry and evangelizing. His passion is to spread the Gospel through any means possible to see the world changed through the message of Jesus Christ.

Rick has been ministering the Gospel for over 25 years and is married to his wife of 40 plus years, Frances.

Viv Zicari a practicing Counsellor/psychotherapist, during her extensive career of seventeen years, she has developed this series of empowerment tools. Each of the tools have been tried and tested, delivering positive and long lasting results to her clients. Empowerment book of forty-nine tools has been written for you the reader, to place you in the driving seat of your life, while not imposing upon anyone else, it will redefine how you interpret you and your world whatever stage of your life journey you are at. Each tool will gradually navigate you through this new journey, arriving at a place where you feel happier and ready to begin a new phase of your life. Rome was not built in a day, a point worth remembering. I dedicate this book to people who have forgotten about themselves.

Viv is originally from the Uk, but she lived in Europe for many years, Viv said it was the many hundreds of people from different cultures which helped Viv to understand diversity in its true form. On her return to the UK Viv attended University to study as an integrative therapist. 

Today Viv has been practicing as a  Counsellor/psychotherapist and empowerment therapist for over seventeen years. Viv works in her busy private practice, and for MIND. Viv also gives semminars and workshops on the empowerment programme she has written, and also lends her experience to third year students. Viv is passionate about people owning their lives, putting themselves first, and discovering contentness which brings with it peace. 

What if you knew that compassion was the antidote to healing our hurt, hate-filled world? Would you know how to use it in every circumstance, with family, friends, and strangers alike? Would you be open to doing so, even when it involved acts that may seem unforgivable? Would you be willing to be gentle and sympathetic with yourself?

If you’re like many people, your heart desires to be compassionate, yet your head may simply not possess the blueprint for saying those right words at the right time, or for seeing things from a compassionate perspective rather than a judgmental one.

After losing my mom in a tragic accident, I was devastated. Witnessing how people responded to me, how my family grieved differently, and how I responded, I went on to become a Certified Grief Recovery Specialist and Transformational Life Coach. But I also  became a keen observer of how people were missing a huge opportunity to operate with more compassion, even if it wasn't something they had been taught.

Laura Jack, author of #1 International Best Seller, The Compassion Code: How to say the right thing when the wrong thing happens, teaches compassionate communication and how we can relate to one another more effectively during the challenging moments in life. Using practices of self-care and self-love, she helps people rediscover their light after loss. Laura’s mission is to cultivate a culture of compassion, starting with self, and to create a better understanding of loss and its accompanying grief.

Proposed Topic:

How to Listen to Your Inner GPS!

“Why are we here? What’s my purpose? And what should I do next?” are questions that come into our lives time and time again. Often people turn to prayer or to others for answers, but what if we can find answers within ourselves? It's all too easy – especially in challenging times like these – to get busy or frantic and ignore our own intuition. I enjoy providing the audience with practical techniques about how to listen to, trust and develop what I call your “Inner GPS.” Below are some of the things I usually address. Your audience will learn how to...

Make successful decisions when they don’t have all the facts.

Be guided by what they feel, as well as by what they think.

Identify the primary ways that intuition communicates with them.

Grow their trust in using intuition for business and personal success.

Envision, attract, and create the life they were meant to live.

Find creative solutions to difficult problems.

I'm the author of eight books on the topic of intuition. I have years of experience as a radio and podcast guest. Feel free to listen to my previous interviews. I'd also be happy to provide you with sample interview questions and a copy of my latest book. I’m looking forward to connecting with you again!

A work of art can be created by almost anyone; but a classic work of art, is achieved by visionaries. I do consider myself a visionary when it comes to the performing arts; and through this entertainment medium, I can help create a balance of peace within our communities. The best talent has yet to surface.

My name is Aldonnius Brian Carter; I was born here in Tallahassee, Florida on December 31st, 1971. I have resided here in Tallahassee, Florida for 40 years of my life and 5 years in Miami, Florida where the writing genius within me was born. I started writing film scripts in 1998; and I currently have 84 film scripts of various genres currently in my arsenal. My first feature film titled "Give it Up" was released and distributed by Echelon Entertainment in 2001. I recently had my second feature film titled "Jack Logan" released by Adler and Associates in March of 2017; and I also had my first novel titled "Power of the P" published and released through Xlibris in April of 2017. My next work is a civil war drama about the true events of Florida's role during the American Civil War. If produced, "Brothers by Blood" will surly bring us closer together as Americans.

Dream analysis has largely been ignored by the more recent body oriented theraputic models and the coaching community.  It is often seen as a relic of the psychoanalytic approach that takes years to result in meaningful change.  Dreamwork, on the other hand seeks to understand dreams, these love letters from the soul into the context that the Dreamer is whole, resourceful and creative.  My work involves understanding the education we receive in Night School to inform our experience in Day School.  In addition to my private practice I work with coaches and other practitioners to demystify the process of working with dreams and leverage the powerful messages they have to convey. 

Life is about transitions and as you will read, I’ve had several.

For the first thirteen years of my adult life I worked in psychiatric facilities, initially as a teacher in a children’s unit and then a therapist doing individual and group work.  I hold an MSW degree from Hunter School of Social Work.

Following that career, I spent time studying acting and working on soap operas and in off-Broadway theaters, was a law school student for a year and a half and spent time as a waiter and a bartender.  On impulse, I taught myself the basics of telecommunications and bootstrapped my way into a job with a Wall Street brokerage firm.

Over the next 25 years my career was governed by a series of phone calls at opportune times asking me to take on projects for which, on paper I had no qualifications.  I worked on large construction projects in financial services culminating in an expanded role in the construction of 60 Wall Street followed by a position as COO of JP Morgan Corporate Real Estate and similar projects around the world.  From those assignments, I shifted into a role as the Chief Risk Officer for Technology and Operations at the bank and then as Managing Director of an Operational Risk Management practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers. 

A stint in my own risk management consultancy led to the position as CIO of McCann Worldgroup followed by a return to my own firm and engagements in Kenya and Thailand.

And then some down time and a struggle to listen into the narrative of my life.

While the careers I've had are varied, the element common to them all is curiosity, which is what caused me to seek out an understanding of who we all are in the early days of my adulthood.  Coaching and it’s emphasis on the wholeness, creativity resourcefulness of the client is a return to that early work but with the wisdom that comes from choices and experience and an understanding that the only lasting change comes from within. 

Note: Anam Cara is Gaelic for “soul friend” and has its origins in the ancient Celtic belief that every person needs a friend who sees their soul and speaks truth to that soul in the service of its destiny.

I'm writing to offer you an interview with acclaimed romance author Lisa Becker, whose lively and hopeful take on dating and romance will inspire even the most jaded among us looking for love! If you're not looking for interview or Q&A candidates at the moment, Lisa is happy to contribute an original article.

Becker, no stranger to the unrequited high school crush, likens them to being as much a part of high school as football games, acne, proms and final exams. "I remember having such a fierce crush on a boy in high school, I would willingly sit with him in the bathroom at parties while he puked up wine coolers, just so I could spend time with him," she jokes.

Thanks to Becker’s real life dating past, as well as her experience writing articles about love and online dating, she can speak expertly about finding love in our modern-day world of love — both online and off. Reflecting on her own tech-based love story, she shares, “I first met my husband while wearing my pajamas." She met her husband 17 years ago when online dating was in its infancy. "I say, people today are 'married' to their cell phones and laptops, so why not use that technology to really get married," she explains of her affinity for online dating,

In an interview, Becker can give hope and knowledge to the masses of lovelorn with dating advice from an expert, including:

Her do’s and don'ts for online dating
How online dating is like a job search
Her own humiliating unrequited high school crush experiences
Her personal love story which inspired her romance writing
What to do when cupid just doesn't seem to be striking

Just let me know if you're interested in talking with Lisa or if you might like to see a review copy of her newest novel, Links (August 1st).

Warmly,

Emma