The Power of the Written Word

I recently watched a late night comedy episode where they stopped people randomly in Los Angeles, under the age of 30, to see if they could properly address a letter. I was dying laughing as I witnessed Generation Z folks misplace stamps and put the return address in the middle of the envelope. It was basically a harsh reminder that snail mail is a dying art.

In November, I attended a conference called, Demystifying Death, that was hosted by Welcome Home of Chattanooga. This non- profit organization provides housing and hospitality to those facing death or a serious illness. Welcome Home of Chattanooga was the dream of the hospice social worker, Sherry Campbell. Sherry and I worked together for many years before she started this nonprofit and her belief veterans, homeless, and all people deserve compassionate care and a home at the end of their life, led to the creation of Welcome Home. On their website this local nonprofit organization proclaims, “We believe that everyone has purpose, and at the end of life, everyone should know that they are important and will be remembered.”

Welcome Home of Chattanooga is also committed to educating the community about grief and death, and during their Demystifying Death conference I attended a workshop called, “Writing a Last Letter.”

The workshop on writing a last letter was led by Judith Pedersen-Benn, who encouraged us to write goodbye letters to our significant loved ones to express our love and gratitude for them. For example you might write a letter to close friends, children, siblings, or even loved ones you are estranged from. This practice of writing a last letter can help the writer embrace their mortality, leave their words as a legacy for their loved ones, find closure about an impending death, express their final wishes, and be an opportunity to explore their feelings.

I worked as a hospice chaplain for 12 years and I often heard people express regret that they didn’t tell their children or spouse they loved them or were proud of them enough, contrition they had not thanked someone for their significant presence in their life, or remorse they had not mended a relationship with a loved one. The workshop I attended at the Demystifying Death conference, reminded me that you can do something about these regrets. You can put pen to paper and your letters will give you a chance to find the words you need to say in order to provide closure and and leave words of legacy to the people you leave behind.

In the last letter workshop, our leader, Judith, encouraged us to have a file to keep the letters in and to let someone know where the file is. She told us some people name their files and shared the story of a Rabbi who called his last letter file his, “God Forbid File.” A woman in our workshop named her file the “Love, Grace, and Gratitude” file. If you don’t feel like you know where to start in writing a letter like this you can look up, The Stanford Letter Project. On their website they have a template for writing a last letter that can help you formulate the thoughts and feelings you desire to express.

While I think writing last letters is a wonderful idea, attending this workshop did not lead me to write one, at least not at this juncture in my life. Instead, it reinforced to me how important both writing letters and receiving letters has been in my lifetime and how I want to continue this important practice.

It reminded me of attending a spiritual growth retreat in high school and the tears I shed at the retreat when I received over 25 letters that weekend from people in my life who put pen to paper to share with me how significant I was to them. It reignited the memory of me sending and receiving letters to my college friends through the USPS, in the late 90s, long before texting was invented. I thought of the letters I wrote in graduate school to a friend deployed overseas. It hearkened me back to the memory of a compassionate boss writing a kind note to me on my birthday every year, but she sent this note not only to me, but to every employee in our organization for her long tenure with the company. It made me think of special poems and birthday cards I have been given through the years, in which loved ones used the written word to let me know how much I matter to them. It provoked a feeling of gratitude for the large file of notes and cards to be kept in perpetuity, written by the family members of hospice patients I cared for who thanked me for my care for their loved one. It took me back to the letters my dad’s college and high school friends wrote me after my dad’s death to tell me how much his life had meant to them. This workshop also brought back the memory of writing a long typed letter to my favorite college professor when he retired, to tell him all the ways his unique and wise presence had inspired my life.

Take a moment in your mind’s eye to imagine what it might feel like to sort through your mail, dealing with your bills and junk mail, to then come across a letter from a close loved one. How would you feel? Most likely you would have emotions such as surprise, joy, and gratitude, that someone took the time to write you a letter and let you know how much you matter to them. This tangible letter would most likely become a gift you can revisit whenever you need an emotional lift.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning once wrote her famous words, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways…” I think this world needs more love letters. During this loneliness epidemic it is imperative to hear the words, “You matter to me” and to intentionally count the way you  love the people in your life. I think the younger generations could benefit in countless ways, if they learned the power of stepping away from social media to write a handwritten love letter. I also think those of us in our mid life or the last season of life, will benefit from putting down our cell phones and coming back the power of the written word.

I encourage you to find your own unique and respective way to write letters to the people you cherish.  Maybe it is a last letter to your spouse, a valentine love letter to your best friend, a yearly letter to a child on their birthday, a just because letter to a colleague, or reinstating a Christmas letter to include in your Christmas card to all your loved ones. I am so grateful for the people in my Iife who have taken the time to name the ways that they love me. Whether we write out messages on paper, on a computer, or even on Instagram, the world we live in needs more love letters. I think people are hungry to hear the messages, “You are good, loved, valued, seen, smart, and so forth.”  Who needs a love letter from you today?

*A version of this article was originally written for The Lookout Mountain Mirror.