What Really Matters

April 30, 2012
Wyatt (The Loss & Grief Survival Guide), a family physician specializing in hospice care, provides touching patient profiles to illustrate her seven life lessons, which include forgiveness, learning to "Dwell in the Present Moment," "Let Go of Expectations," and more. Readers are introduced to a range of patients: plagued by a degenerative neuromuscular disorder, Ashley is an effectively comatose 18-year-old who can only say "I love you," and whom Wyatt describes as a "pure vessel for the transmission of Divine love;" Ralph is a 60-year-old alcoholic living in a "tumbledown" apartment complex and dying of renal cancer who spends his final months drafting gorgeous pencil-drawings of "things seen in life." Occasionally, Wyatt lapses into aphorismâas when she notes that "genuine forgiveness requires a shifting of one's energy away from hatredâ¦toward healingâ" but fails to follow up with practical methods for doing so. While some of her advice may come across as New Age-y, the overriding messageâto "not only accept change" but "embrace impermanence"âhas roots in many traditional systems of spirituality, allowing this book to appeal to a wide swath of readers. While not always a pragmatic guide to coping with tragedy and loss, Wyatt's newest is nevertheless an inspirational volume.