At the time of a loved one’s passing, close family and friends often seek to come together to honor the loved one’s impactful life. It is not uncommon for the family members in charge of planning a celebration of life to feel lost or overwhelmed when thinking through how to plan a gathering that honors their loved one’s authentic life. Whether you are looking for an event rooted in your loved one’s personal, cultural, or spiritual identity, a celebration of life event planner can serve as a guide for creating a unique vision that pays tribute to your loved one’s unique identity. When you work with a celebration of life event planner, they can help you plan a deeply personal and unique memorial for your loved one.
The Uniqueness of a Celebration of Life Event Planner
Unlike a traditional event planner, celebration of life event planners handle more than just event logistics. At the heart of many celebration of life gatherings is a ceremony honoring the loved one’s life, impact, beliefs, values, passions, accomplishments, relationships, and more.
Celebration of life event planners have the important role of helping families create a ceremony that represents their loved one’s unique life and identity. Through getting to know the life and personality of the loved one who has passed, a celebration of life event planner can help create an environment for people to mourn, remember, and celebrate their impact in a way that the individual being honored would have wanted.
Alternatively, families may think a celebration of life event planner is like a traditional funeral director. However, these two roles differ in their focus. A funeral director often helps arrange for care of a loved one’s body, including transportation, cremation or casket burial, and legal documents. They are often well-versed in traditional funeral arrangements. A celebration of life event planner is typically more focused on helping a family plan a modern and personalized ceremony in tribute to their loved one’s life. This may involve the speakers selected, readings chosen, music played, photos & videos shown, and much much more. They can also help provide guidance for supporting details that contribute to the vision for the ceremony – such as location of the gathering, food served, flowers or decor included, or keepsakes selected for guests to remember a loved one by.
Personalized Celebrations of Life
Celebration of life event planners recognize that, when it comes to memorials and rituals after one’s passing, there is no one-size-fits-all. Throughout our lives, each of us is unique in our interests, personality, culture, spirituality, and more. The ways we celebrate life after a passing can be just as unique
If your loved one was a devout person of faith, this can be recognized and honored in their celebration of life. Your celebration of life event planner can help you find ways to include your loved one’s favorite prayer, worship song, or scripture verses into your event. They can also help incorporate religious symbols into the space. Some families choose to involve their family religious official to deliver prayer during the ceremony.
Conversely, celebration of life event planners can serve as guides for those who are seeking to create meaningful rituals without elements of faith. Historically, there has been a strong association between rituals after one’s passing and religious institutions. Celebration of life event planners can help assure you that this does not have to be the case if it is not the right fit for your family, as rituals can be meaningfully created without aspects of faith. Honoring and sharing the values, perspective on life, and impact of the individual being honored is a way of celebrating who they uniquely were as a person.
Perhaps your loved one was proud of their rich cultural background. A celebration of life event planner can help you honor your loved one’s background by incorporating traditional customs into the memorial service. For some, this involves practicing end of life rituals associated with their heritage. For others, their culture manifests in the clothing worn to the ceremony or the cuisine served to the guests. Honoring one’s heritage can also be present in the languages spoken during the ceremony.
Celebration of life event planners can help create rituals, ceremonies, and traditions unique to your loved one. By getting to know what made your loved one special and unique, celebration of life event planners can include purposeful details in your memorial. For example, adding small touches like flowers in their favorite colors, creating a compilation of their favorite sayings and quotes, incorporating their favorite songs, or catering from their favorite restaurants can contribute to making a gathering that feels truly specific to your loved one.
At Lighten, we believe in the importance of creating rituals that honor the uniqueness of your loved one. If you are looking for guidance in planning a personalized memorial, Lighten can be your guide.
