How To Face Your Fear of Dying

How To! with Mike Pesca

Peach Fish Projects

Education, How To

4.3 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 8 December 2020

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Katie is terrified of dying. As the youngest in a big family, she can't stop thinking about the fact that all her loved ones may die before she does. Katie is a comedy writer who knows how to get laughs, but her obsession with death is real, and getting in the way of living. In this episode of How To!, we bring on Rachel Menzies, a psychologist and researcher at the University of Sydney and author of Tales from the Valley of Death, to share what she's learned about death anxiety. Exposure therapy is often the most effective way to overcome your fears, but how do you expose yourself to death? Rachel has some unusual ideas for Katie—and all of us—to take control of these intrusive thoughts, starting with lying in a body bag. Focusing deliberately on death, Rachel says, can actually help us appreciate life.

If you liked this episode, check out "How To Not Be Scared."

Are you afraid of something? Send us a note at howto@slate.com or leave us a voicemail at 646-495-4001 and we might have you on the show.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi everyone, I'm Susie Weiss, and I've noticed there's just simply not enough podcasts in the world. So I'm launching my own. Let's go. Let's go, baby. Second Thought is a weekly show about pop culture. The stuff everyone's been binging, arguing about, obsessing over. Here's the thing about heated rivalry. I mean, even the most devoted swifties, I think we can agree, not our best work. We'll be hosting thoughtful conversations with culture's most important figures. Talk about genius.
0:22.6	Talk about generational talent.
0:23.7	Coming to headphones near you
0:24.8	on April 17th with a first guest you won't want to miss. Available wherever you get your podcasts.
0:30.2	I remember being as young as two years old and going into my parents' room and just hugging
0:36.4	them and sobbing and they would be like,
0:39.9	what's wrong? And I would say, I'm going to be so sad when you die, as though I was predicting
0:45.3	something. Like I was one of those weird kids from a horror movie.
0:52.2	Welcome to how to. I'm Charles Duhigg.
0:55.0	During the past few months, as we all know, we have been constantly reminded of our own mortality.
1:02.0	It happens when we leave the house or put on a mask or just read the news.
1:07.0	And many of us unfortunately have experienced loss in our own lives.
1:11.7	So what do you do when the fear of dying feels inescapable?
1:15.3	How do you live your life without always worrying about the end?
1:19.1	Our listener this week needs to know the answer.
1:22.5	Like, would you say you think about death every day?
1:25.2	Every second of every day, almost.
1:29.3	This is Katie from Chicago. She's a successful comedy writer for TV shows, and although she spends her days writing jokes,
1:34.3	her problem is real and serious.
1:37.3	Basically, when I'm with people, I think about when they're going to die,
1:43.3	when I'm having fun.
1:46.0	It always turns into, oh, this is going to be sad when these people are no longer here.
	...

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