On Death and Dying Quotes

“Is war perhaps nothing else but a need to face death, to conquer and master it, to come out of it alive -- a peculiar form of denial of our mortality?”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“Those who have the strength and the love to sit with a dying patient in the silence that goes beyond words will know that this moment is neither frightening nor painful, but a peaceful cessation of the functioning of the body. Watching a peaceful death of a human being reminds us of a falling star; one of a million lights in a vast sky that flares up for a brief moment”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“Simple people with less education, sophistication, social ties, and professional obligations seem in general to have somewhat less difficulty in facing this final crisis than people of affluence who lose a great deal more in terms of material luxuries, comfort, and number of interpersonal relationships. It appears that people who have gone through a life of suffering, hard work, and labor, who have raised their children and been gratified in their work, have shown greater ease in accepting death with peace and dignity compared to those who have been ambitiously controlling their environment, accumulating material goods, and a great number of social relationships but few meaningful interpersonal relationships which would have been available at the end of life.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“We cannot look at the sun all the time, we cannot face death all the time.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“We often tend to ignore how much of a child is still in all of us.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“It is very important that you do only what you love to do. You may be poor, you may go hungry, you may live in a shabby place, but you will totally live. And at the end of your days, you will bless your life because you have done what you came here to do.”
― Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, Sobre la muerte y los moribundos

“It might be helpful if more people would talk about death and dying as an intrinsic part of life just as they do not hesitate to mention when someone is expecting a new baby.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“Education makes you humble, it doesn't make you proud.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“Religious patients seemed to differ little from those without a religion.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“Simple people with less education, sophistication, social ties, and professional obligations seem in general to have somewhat less difficulty in facing this final crisis than people of affluence who lose a great deal more in terms of material luxuries, comfort, and number of interpersonal relationships.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“The belief has long died that suffering here on earth will be rewarded in heaven. Suffering has lost its meaning.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“I think it is cruel to expect the constant presence of any one family member (to tend to the ill). Just as we have to breathe in and breathe out, people have to "recharge their batteries" outside the sickroom at times, live a normal life from time to time; we cannot function efficiently in the constant awareness of illness. I have heard many relatives complain that members of the family went on pleasure trips over weekends or continued to go to the theater or movie. They blamed them for enjoying things while someone at home was terminally ill. I think it is more meaningful for the patient and his family to see that the illness does not totally disrupt a household or completely deprive all members of any pleasurable activities; rather, the illness may allow for a gradual adjustment and change toward the kind of home it is going to be when the patient is no longer around...The family too has a need to deny or avoid the sad realities at times in order to face them better when their presence is really needed.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“When we look back in time and study old cultures and ­people, we are impressed that death has always been distasteful to man and will probably always be”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“How, then, do we know when a patient is giving up “too early” when we feel that a little fight on his part combined with the help of the medical profession could give him a chance to live longer? How can we differentiate this from the stage of acceptance, when our wish to prolong his life often contradicts his wish to rest and die in peace? If we are unable to differentiate these two stages we do more harm than good to our patients, we will be frustrated in our efforts, and will make his dying a painful last experience.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“When we finally had a patient, he welcomed me with open arms. He invited me to sit down and it was obvious that he was eager to speak. I told him that I did not wish to hear him now but would return the next day with my students. I was not sensitive enough to appreciate his communications. It was so hard to get one patient, I had to share him with my students. Little did I realize then that when such a patient says “Please sit down now,” tomorrow may be too late. When we revisited him the next day, he was lying back in his pillow, too weak to speak. He made a meager attempt to lift his arm and whispered “Thank you for trying”—he died less than an hour later and kept to himself what he wanted to share with us and what we so desperately wanted to learn.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“To me, the average person praying is begging for something. Always had too much pride to actually beg.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“It's only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on Earth—and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up—that we will begin to live each day to the fullest.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“With the extensive treatment and hospitalization, financial burdens are added; little luxuries at first and necessities later on may not be afforded anymore. The immense sums that such treatments and hospitalizations cost in recent years have forced many patients to sell the only possessions they had; they were unable to keep a house which they built for their old age, unable to send a child through college, and unable perhaps to make many dreams come true.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families

“we have long and controversial discussions about whether patients should be told the truth—a question that rarely arises when the dying person is tended by the family physician who has known him from delivery to death and who knows the weaknesses and strengths of each member of the family.”
― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families