As a culture, we avoid talking about death. Whether it’s because of existential angst (the worry about what’ll happen to us after we die?), a simple association with sadness and sorrow (we’ve experienced other peoples deaths but by definition we’ve never died ourselves), or because of an empathic understanding of how sad our death may make our friends and loved ones (at least, we assume so). This is very understandable but it’s counterproductive all the same. By treating death as something unspeakable we avoid it’s consideration at all cost. The effect of this avoidance is huge. Though it might feel like bringing a sledgehammer to break a nut, remembering that…