The Art of Manliness Podcast

Episode Title: Make Friends With Death to Live a Better Life
Guest: Joanna Ebenstein (Founder of Morbid Anatomy; Author of Memento Mori)
Date: October 28, 2025
Host: Brett McKay

Episode Overview

This episode explores the profound relationship between contemplating death and living a more intentional, satisfying life. Host Brett McKay interviews Joanna Ebenstein, founder of Morbid Anatomy and author of Memento Mori: The Art of Contemplating Death to Live a Better Life. Together, they discuss how Western society lost its intimate familiarity with death, the consequences of this cultural shift, and how restoring personal practices and rituals around mortality can bring clarity and vitality to life.

Joanna also shares historical traditions, modern practices for making peace with mortality, and practical advice on preparing for one’s own death—all rooted in a spirit of curiosity, reverence, and genuine humanity.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

How Our Relationship with Death Has Changed

• Historical Intimacy with Death
  • Death used to be part of daily life: people died at home, bodies were prepared by family, and rituals happened in the home (03:40–06:23).
  • Mourning practices involved activities like post-mortem photography and making hair wreaths from the deceased as acts of remembrance and meditation (06:51–09:35).
  • “The idea that we can deny death at all is a luxury unique to our time and place.” — Joanna Ebenstein (03:40)
• The Modern Shift: Professionalization & Sanitization
  • Rise of hospitals, funeral homes, and hygiene concerns physically and psychologically distanced people from death (10:11–12:58).
  • Living rooms were once called “parlors”—rooms where bodies were laid out. “Living room” emerged to distinguish spaces of the living from the dead (06:40–07:56).

Psychological and Cultural Consequences

• Denying Death = Unfulfilling Lives
  • Distance from death leads to unresolved regrets, difficulties grieving, and fear that is “easily manipulated by others” (10:33–12:58).
  • “By contemplating death, [we] live this incredible life that we all remember… I’m no Steve Jobs, but I will say I’ve lived a life true to who I am.” — Joanna Ebenstein (13:11)
• Making Friends with Death
  • Personal rituals, like death meditations before flights, offered clarity and a “goad” to live honestly (13:11–15:06).
  • Inspired by Carl Jung: “Rather than deny it, it just seems to make better sense to look it in the eye. And then by looking it in the eye, it ceases to be so frightening.” (15:15–17:20)

Practices for Coming to Terms with Mortality

• Memento Mori: The Art of Remembering Death (19:07–24:41)

  • Memento mori are objects, artworks, or rituals meant to remind us of our mortality – from Roman skeletons at feasts, to vanitas still life paintings, to displaying skulls and bones at home.
  • Purpose differs: carpe diem (enjoy life) versus preparation to “meet your maker” in Christian art.
  • “There are many, many forms of memento mori… The idea is, life is short.” — Joanna Ebenstein (19:07)

• Death Meditation (31:12–33:51)

  • Meditative practices across cultures—Buddhist, Christian, Jungian—help people mentally let go of attachments and prepare for death with relief rather than fear:
    • “What really stuck with me is… you let the things you’re attached to go. And by doing that, there’s such a sense of… it’s not fear, it’s relief” (32:25).
  • Reading near-death experiences supports the transformative, positive nature of letting go.

• Developing Your Own "Myth of Death" (17:58–18:35, 34:15–36:22)

  • Inspired by Jung: it’s vital to create a personal, meaningful idea of what happens after death, rather than blindly accepting received wisdom.
  • “You must have your own idea of what will happen after you die, and that is part of what will ease you through the death process.” — Joanna (17:27)

Rethinking Grief & Mourning

• Restoring Community & Ritual
  • Historical and indigenous practices required extended, communal expressions of grief—crying, shrieking, physically “looking bad”—to process loss and prevent psychological distress (42:19–43:53).
  • Modern Western society tends to suppress grief for practicality or productivity, sometimes medicating it away: “People...take [antidepressants] because they feel like they have to drug themselves to interact with other people...They feel like they can't fall apart in front of others” (44:06–44:43).
• The Value of Grief (45:06–47:15)
  • Grief can be a “cracking open” or a way to let in deeper feelings and beauty: “It’s the crack in us that the light gets in, that the beauty comes in through the wound, the crack, the pain.” — Joanna Ebenstein (46:50)

Staying Connected to the Dead

• Communicating with Departed Loved Ones (47:33–50:21)
  • Many continue to speak with deceased loved ones instinctively, even if they no longer "believe" in an afterlife.
  • “Whether it’s capital T true or not doesn’t really matter, but they talk to the dead, and it makes them feel better.” (47:33)
  • Traditions like Día de los Muertos and genealogy serve this deep human need: “I just love that idea of making sure that their memory still lives on in some way.” — Brett McKay (50:21).

Preparing for a "Good Death"

• Defining the Good Death (51:03–51:59)
  • Varies by culture and individual: in the past, meant dying at home, consciously, surrounded by loved ones.
  • "If you could choose how to die, what would that be? For me, I’d like to be conscious. I’d like to go into the mystery with consciousness..." — Joanna (51:03)
• Practical Steps: Advance Planning (52:06–54:14)
  • Swedish Death Cleaning: gradually decluttering possessions to ease the burden on loved ones.
  • Practicalities: have a will, estate plan, advance directive, and share your digital passwords.
    • “Leave your passwords somewhere for your loved ones... You’d be shocked at how hard that can be once you die.” — Joanna (53:43)

Living With Death in Mind

• Contemplating Death Brings Clarity and Courage (54:20–56:04)
  • Joanna feels more at peace and less afraid of death after years spent immersed in this subject.
  • “I’m doing work that I absolutely love, that feels important and vital and meaningful to me and to my community, and that gives me a sense of meaning and satisfaction... I don’t want to say pleased... I have satisfaction.” (55:21)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

“The idea that we can deny death at all is a luxury unique to our time and place.”
— Joanna Ebenstein (03:40)

"By contemplating death, [we] live this incredible life… I’ve lived a life true to who I am."
— Joanna Ebenstein (13:11)

“What really stuck with me is... you let the things you’re attached to go. And... there’s such a sense of... it’s not fear, it’s relief.”
— Joanna Ebenstein on Jungian death meditation (32:25)

"You must have your own idea of what will happen after you die, and that is part of what will ease you through the death process."
— Joanna Ebenstein (17:27)

“It’s the crack in us that the light gets in, that the beauty comes in through the wound, the crack, the pain.”
— Joanna Ebenstein (46:50)

“Whether it’s capital T true or not doesn’t really matter, but they talk to the dead, and it makes them feel better.”
— Joanna Ebenstein (47:33)

“If you could choose how to die, what would that be? For me, I’d like to be conscious… I want to experience this mystery.”
— Joanna Ebenstein (51:03)

“Leave your passwords somewhere for your loved ones... You’d be shocked at how hard that can be once you die.”
— Joanna Ebenstein (53:43)

Key Timestamps

• 03:40 – Modern avoidance of death vs. past intimacy
• 06:40–07:56 – Origin of the ‘living room’
• 10:33–12:58 – Psychological consequence of denying death
• 13:11 – Personal rituals; Steve Jobs’ daily death meditation
• 15:15–17:20 – Jung: integrating death for a whole life
• 19:07–24:41 – Memento mori objects, art, and practices
• 31:12–33:51 – Death meditations (Buddhist, Christian, Jungian)
• 34:15–36:22 – Myths of death, afterlife beliefs across cultures
• 42:19–44:43 – Rituals of grieving: communal & suppressed expressions
• 45:06–47:15 – Grief as a transformative, meaningful emotion
• 47:33–50:21 – Speaking with the dead, memory, and cultural practices
• 51:03–54:14 – Defining and planning for a “good death”
• 54:20–56:04 – Living fully by embracing mortality

Further Information & Resources

• Joanna Ebenstein’s work: morbidanatomy.org
• Book: Memento Mori: The Art of Contemplating Death to Live a Better Life
• Related book: Death – A Graveside Companion by Joanna Ebenstein
• Archives, show notes, and deeper dives: artofmanliness.com

Takeaway:
Embracing mortality—rather than denying or hiding from it—is an ancient, cross-cultural, and psychologically enriching practice. Through rituals, reflection, and practical preparation, we can live more courageously, with clearer values, and forge deeper connections to ourselves, our loved ones, and the generations that came before us.