Death Mitch Albom Quotes & Sayings

EVERYONE JOINS A BAND IN THIS LIFE. You are born into your first one. Your mother plays the lead. She shares the stage with your father and siblings. Or perhaps your father is absent, an empty stool under a spotlight. But he is still a founding member, and if he surfaces one day, you will have to make room for him. As life goes on, you will join other bands, some through friendship, some through romance, some through neighborhoods, school, an army. Maybe you will all dress the same, or laugh at your own private vocabulary. Maybe you will flop on couches backstage, or share a boardroom table, or crowd around a galley inside a ship. But in each band you join, you will play a distinct part, and it will affect you as much as you affect it. And, as is usually the fate with bands, most of them will break up - through distance, differences, divorce, or death. — Mitch Albom

Love is how you stay alive, even after you are gone. — Mitch Albom

The mystery of death is why it chooses a particular moment. With no earthly answer, coincidence can become conspiracy. — Mitch Albom

Instead, he would make death his final project, the center point of his days. Since everyone was going to die, he could be of great value, right? He could be research. A human textbook. Study me in my slow and patient demise. Watch what happens to me. Learn with me. — Mitch Albom

As my visits with Morrie go on, I begin to read about death, how different cultures view the final passage. There is a tribe in the North American Arctic, for example, who believe that all things on earth have a soul that exists in a miniature form of the body that hold it -so that a deer has a tiny deer inside it, and a man has a tiny man inside him. When the large being dies, that tiny form lives on. It can slide into something being born nearby, or it can go to a temporary resting place in the sky, in the belly of a great feminine spirit, where it waits until the moon can send it back to earth.
Sometimes, they say, the moon is so busy with the new souls of the world that it disappears from the sky. That is why we have moonless nights. But in the end, the moon always returns, as do we all.
That is what they believe. — Mitch Albom

But Father Time is real. And, in truth, he cannot age. Beneath the unruly beard and cascading hair - signs of life, not death - his body is lean, his skin unwrinkled, immune to the very thing he lords over. — Mitch Albom

At that moment i felt lonelier than i'd ever felt before, and that loneliness seemed to squat in my lungs and crush all but my most minimal breathing. There was nothing left to say. Not about this. Not about anything. — Mitch Albom

Die as a sacrifice is more worthy then a suicide — Mitch Albom

Ness-that Morrie was looking at life from some very different place than anyone else I knew. A healthier place. A more sensible place. And he was about to die.
But it was also becoming clear to me- through his courage, his humor, his patience, and his openIf some mystical clarity of thought came when you looked death in the eye, then I knew Morrie wanted to share it. — Mitch Albom

What do people fear most about death? I asked the reb.
"Fear?" he thought for a moment. 'Well, for one thing, what happens next? Where do we go? Is it what we imagined?"
That's big.
"Yes. But there's something else."
What else?
He leaned forward.
"Being forgotten," he whispered. — Mitch Albom

Fairness, he said, 'does not govern life and death. If it did, no good person would ever die young. — Mitch Albom

Maybe death is the great equalizer, the one big thing that can finally make strangers shed a tear for one another — Morrie Schwartz.

Morrie," Koppel said, "that was seventy years ago your mother died. The pain still goes on?"
"You bet," Morrie whispered. — Mitch Albom

Death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between being taken and being missed, lives are changed. — Mitch Albom

Death: the only true emotion felt in an apathetic world — Mitch Albom

We all have the same beginning - birth - and we all have the same end - death. So how different can we be? — Mitch Albom

Life has to end," she said. "Love doesn't. — Mitch Albom

The dead sit at our tables long after they have gone. — Mitch Albom

A funeral is no place for secrets. — Mitch Albom

We are, as we die, who we most were in life... — Mitch Albom

We really don't experience the world fully, because we're half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do."
And facing death changes that?
"Oh, yes. You strip away all that stuff and you focus on the essentials. — Mitch Albom

Fairness does not govern life and death. — Mitch Albom

Why is it so hard to think about dying? "Because," Morrie continued, "most of us all walk around as if we're sleepwalking. We really don't experience the world fully, because we're half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do." And facing death changes all that? "Oh, yes. You strip away all that stuff and you focus on the essentials. When you realize you are going to die, you see everything much differently. — Mitch Albom

I used to think I knew everything. I was a "smart person" who "got things done," and because of that, the higher I climbed, the more I could look down and scoff at what seemed silly or simple, even religion.
But I realized something as I drove home that night: that I am neither better nor smarter, only luckier. And I should be ashamed of thinking I knew everything, because you can know the whole world and still feel lost in it. So many people are in pain-no matter how smart or accomplished-they cry, they yearn, they hurt.But instead of looking down on things, they look up, which is where I should have been looking, too. Because when the world quiets to the sound of your own breathing, we all want the same things:comfort, love, and a peaceful heart. — Mitch Albom

You live on - in the hearts of everyone you have touched and nurtured while you were here ... Death ends life, not a relationship. — Mitch Albom

Time," the Captain said, "is not what you think." He sat down next to Eddie. "Dying? Not the end of everything. We think it is. But what happens on earth is only the beginning. — Mitch Albom

Death is the end of a lifetime, not the end of a relationship. — Mitch Albom

The second death. To think that you died and no one would remember you. I wondered if this was why we tried so hard to make our mark in America. To be known. Think of how important celebrity has become. We sing to get famous; expose our worst secrets to get famous; lose weight, eat bugs, even commit murder to get famous. Our young people post their deepest thoughts on public web sites. They run cameras from their bedrooms. It's as if we are screaming Notice Me! Remember Me! Yet the notoriety barely lasts. Names quickly blur and in time are forgotten. — Mitch Albom

But everyone knows someone who has died, I said.
Why is it so hard to think about dying?
'Because,' Morrie continued, 'most of us walk around as if we're sleepwalking. We really don't experience the world fully, because we're half asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do.'
And facing death changes all that?
'Oh, yes. You strip away all that stuff and you focus on the essentials. When you realize you are going to die, you see everything much differently.'
He sighed. 'Learn how to die, and you learn how to live. — Mitch Albom

The story of my recent life.' I like that phrase. It makes more sense than 'the story of my life', because we get so many lives between birth and death. A life to be a child. A life to come of age. A life to wander, to settle, to fall in love, to parent, to test our promise, to realize our mortality- and in some lucky cases, to do something after that realization. — Mitch Albom

Philosophy was that death should not be embarrassing; he was not about to powder its nose. — Mitch Albom

This is your house, Reb. You are in the rafters, the floorboards, the walls, the lights. You are in every echo through every hallway. We hear you now. I hear you still. How can I - how can any of us - let you go? You are woven through us, from birth to death. — Mitch Albom

Personally, I always wondered about authors and celebrities who loudly declared there was no God. It was usually when they were healthy and popular and being listened to by crowds. What happens, I wondered, in the quiet moments before death? By then, they have lost the stage, the world has moved on. If suddenly, in their last gasping moments, through fear, a vision, a late enlightenment, they change their minds about God, who would know? — Mitch Albom

It is because the human spirit knows, deep down, that all lives intersect. That death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between being taken and being missed, lives are changed."
" ... We think such thngs are random. But there is a balance to it all. One withers, another grows. Birth and death are part of a whole." "It is why we are drawn to babies ... " "And to funerals. — Mitch Albom

My old professor, meanwhile, was stunned by the normalcy of the day around him. Shouldn't the world stop? Don't they know what has happened to me?
But the world did not stop, it took no notice at all

Morrie's doctors guessed he had two years left. Morrie knew it was less.
But my old professor had made a profound decision, one he began to construct the day he came out of the doctor's office with a sword hanging over his head. Do I wither up and disappear, or do I make the best of my time left? he had asked himself.
He would not wither. He would not be ashamed of dying.
Instead, he would make death his final project, the center point of his days. Since everyone was going to die, he could be of great value, right? He could be research. A human textbook. Study me in my slow and patient demise. Watch what happens to me. Learn with me.
Morrie would walk that final bridge between life and death, and narrate the trip. — Mitch Albom

I would lying if I said I would laugh in the face of death. — Mitch Albom

People don't die because of loyalty."
They don't?" She smiled. "Religion? Government? Are we not loyal to such things, sometimes to the death?"
Eddie shrugged.
Better," she said, "to be loyal to one another. — Mitch Albom

Had he known his death was imminent, he might have gone somewhere else. Instead, he did what we all do. He went about his dull routine as if all the days in the world were still to come. — Mitch Albom

In heaven, there is no judgment, but rather an opportunity to examine our lives-who we touched, the choices we made, and the consequences of those choices.
-Blue Man — Mitch Albom

And I suppose tapes are a desperate attempt to steal something from Death's suitcase. — Mitch Albom

My funeral," the Blue Man said. "Look at the mourners. Some did not even know me well, yet they came. Why? Did you ever wonder? Why people gather when others die? Why people feel they should?
"It is because the human spirit knows, deep down, that all lives intersect. That death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between being taken and being missed, lives are changed.
"You say you should have died instead of me. But during my time on earth, people died instead of me, too. It happens every day. When lightning strikes a minute after you are gone, or an airplane crashes that you might have been on. When your colleague falls ill and you do not. We think such things are random. But there is a balance to it all. One withers, another grows. Birth and death are part of a whole.
"It is why we are drawn to babies ... " He turned to the mourners. "And to funerals. — Mitch Albom

It's not contagious, you know. Death is as natural as life. It's part of the deal we made. — Mitch Albom

The problem, Mitch, is that we don't believe we are as much alike as we are. Whites and blacks, Catholics and Protestants, men and women. If we saw each other as more alike, we might be very eager to join in one big human family in this world, and to care about that family the way we care about our own.
But believe me, when you are dying, you see it is true. We all have the same beginning - birth - and we all have the same end - death. So how different can we be?
Invest in the human family. Invest in people. Build a little community of those you love and who love you.
Morrie Schwartz — Mitch Albom

I love you every day. And now I will miss you every day. — Mitch Albom

He had recorded a message to be played upon his death. He had told no one - except Teela, his shopping companion and health care worker, who delivered the tape to his family. It was brief. But in it, the Reb answered the two questions he had most been asked in his life of faith. One was whether he believed in God. He said he did. The other was whether there is life after death. On this he said, "My answer here, too, is yes, there is something. But friends, I'm sorry. Now that I know, I can't even tell you." The whole place broke up laughing. — Mitch Albom

We all have same beginning (BIRTH), and we will have same ending (DEATH). So how different can we be? — Mitch Albom

But it's hard to explain, Mitch. Now that I'm suffering, I feel closer to people who suffer than I ever did before. The other night, on TV, I saw people in Bosnia running across the street, getting fired upon, killed, innocent victims ... and I just started to cry. I feel their anguish as if it were my own. I don't know any of these people. But
how can I put this?
I'm almost ... drawn to them. — Mitch Albom

Sometimes during the night, your father awakened. He rose from his bed, staggered across the room, and found the strength to raise the window sash. He called your mother's name with what little voice he had, and he called yours, too, and your brother, Joe. And he called for Mickey. At that moment, it seemed, his heart was spilling out, all the guilt and regret. Perhaps he felt the light of death approaching. Perhaps he only knew you were all out there somewhere, in the streets beneath his window. He bent over the ledge. The night was chilly. The wind and damp, in his state, were too much. He was dead before dawn. — Mitch Albom

The truth is, once you learn how to die, you learn how to live. — Mitch Albom

Her death was as insignificant as her life. — Mitch Albom

It's natural to die," he said again. "The fact that we make such a big hullabaloo over it is all because we don't see ourselves as part of nature. We think because we're human we're something above nature."

He smiled at the plant.

"We're not. Everything that gets born, dies. — Mitch Albom

But she wasn't around, and that's the thing when your parents die, you feel like instead of going in to every fight with backup, you are going into every fight alone. — Mitch Albom

Everyone knows they're going to die, but nobody believes it ... So we kid ourselves about death ... But there's a better approach. To know you're going to dies, and to be prepared for it at any time ... Do what the Buddhists do ... ask, Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be? — Mitch Albom

In the South American rainforest, there is a tribe called the Desana, who see the world as a fixed quantity of energy that flows between all creatures. Every birth must therefore engender a death, and every death brings forth another birth. This way, the energy of the world remains complete.
When they hunt for food, the Desana know the animals they kill will leave a hole in the spiritual well. But that hole will be filled, they believe, by the Desana hunters when they die. Were there no men dying, there would be no birds or fish being born. I like this idea. Morrie likes it, too. The closer he gets to goodbye, the more he seems to feel we are all creatures in the same forest. What we take, we must replenish.
"It's only fair," he says. — Mitch Albom

When death takes your mother, it steals that word forever. — Mitch Albom

His body had been weakened, the ocen had left him vulnerable, pneumonia took ahold of him, and in time, he died.'
Because of Mickey?' Eddie said.
Because of loyalty,' she said.
People don't die because of loyalty.'
They don't?' She smiled. 'Religion? Government? Are we not loyal to such things, sometimes to the death?... Better,... to be loyal to one another.'
~pg 138 — Mitch Albom

I hope you never hear those words. Your mom. She died. They are different than other words. They are too big to fit in your ears. They belong to some strange, heavy, powerful language that pounds away at the side of your head, a wrecking ball coming at you again and again, until finally, the words crack a hole large enough to fit inside your brain. And in so doing, they split you apart. — Mitch Albom

You say you should have died instead of me. But during my time on earth, people died instead of me, too. It happens every day. When lightning strikes a minute after you are gone, or an airplane crashes that you might have been on. When your colleague falls ill and you do not. We think such things are random. But there is a balance to it all. One withers, another grows. Birth and death are part of a whole. — Mitch Albom

In stories about life after death, the soul often floats above the good-bye moment, hovering over police cars at highway accidents, or clinging like a spider to hospital-room ceilings. These are people who receive a second chance, who somehow, for some reason, resume their place in the world. — Mitch Albom

In a strange way, I envied the quality of Morrie's time even as I lamented its diminishing supply. Why did we bother with all the distractions we did? — Mitch Albom

I believe he died this way on purpose. I believe he wanted no chilling moments, no one to witness his last breath and be haunted by it, the way he had been haunted by his mother's death-notice telegram or by his father's corpse in the city morgue. — Mitch Albom

Being unheard is the ground floor of giving up, and giving up is the ground floor of doing yourself in. It's not so much, what's the point? It's more like, what's the difference? — Mitch Albom

There is no fair in life and death. If it were, no good men would die young. — Mitch Albom