We are educators. Our goal is to bring death “out of the closet” and back into life, as a natural part of life.
Natural Transitions is a multi-faceted, dynamic non-profit organization.
We publish NATURAL TRANSITIONS MAGAZINE, the only magazine about conscious and holistic approaches to end of life.
AND we provide DIRECT SERVICES TO FAMILIES, educating and supporting them to prepare for death and conduct family-led after-death care. This page tells you more about our DIRECT CARE SERVICES, OUR TRAINING PROGRAMS IN TRANSITION GUIDANCE, AND OTHER NT EVENTS.
We support families by providing them with education about options to create meaningful, personal rites of passage at death. Our educational consultations, planning meetings with key family members to talk about options for family-led after-death care, including home funerals and wakes and green practices after death, are our particular area of expertise. We aim to minimize our support role and to empower families to create what for them is a most personal experience of caring for their loved-ones.
Our at-death assistance is tailored to whatever the family wants or needs and no more.
Presentations. Since 2003, we have offered countless presentations to professionals and lay persons about preparation for death as a rite of passage, and the option of family-led, green after-death care known as a “home funeral.”
NT can provide speakers for your event. Please contact us with your interest at info@naturaltransitions.org
Workshops/Trainings… sharing our knowledge. Our trainings are designed for professionals working with end of life as well as family members seeking to care for their own at death. Our current foundational training provides information on the dying process, advanced health care directives, as well as the option of a home funeral including green options in funerary care. We have heard how these trainings have given participants the knowledge and above all, the confidence, to create beautiful, meaningful, and affordable rites of passage at death, that are life-changing for the bereaved, and profoundly honoring of the dead.
Photo: A workshop participant in repose during the care of the body demonstration.
Conferences... a national leader
2008 was the first year that Natural Transitions stepped up to organize a national conference for those interested in holistic, environmentally conscious death care. That year, Natural Transitions hosted the first Green Burial Conference for advocates of this natural, earth-friendly option of returning the body to the earth without embalming chemicals, in biodegradable coffins or shrouds, and with minimal resource usage. Mark Harris, former environmental reporter for the LA Times Syndicate and author of the acclaimed Grave Matters, was our keynote.
In 2009, Natural Transitions held the first national conference that brought together home funeral educators and their supporters. Natural Transitions organized a facilitated meeting of some 40 plus key members of the home funeral movement that culminated in the formation of an interim board that would create bylaws and file for the non-profit incorporation of a new 501(c)3 National Home Funeral Alliance.
2010 and 2011, Natural Transitions hosted the first national conferences under the banner of the newly formed National Home Funeral Alliance.
Festivals
In 2011, the unique, Life And Death Matters festival of international film, theater and educational programming (aka LADmatters) was a multi-media exploration of how we face and navigate life challenges. Natural Transitions believes in the power of media to open our hearts and minds to topics of cultural sensitivity, not least, death and dying.