A deeper way through grief, death anxiety, and life transition.
Sacred Thanatology offers non-pathologizing grief coaching, contemplative support, and transformative workshops for individuals and organizations. You do not have to navigate loss, mortality, or profound change alone.
Ways to work together
Death anxiety is one of the most universal—and least discussed—human experiences. It may appear as fear of dying, fear of losing loved ones, fear of illness, aging, uncertainty, or the realization that life is finite. Often, these fears quietly shape the way we live, influencing our relationships, decisions, and sense of purpose.
The Sacred Thanatology Death Anxiety Coaching Program offers a compassionate, transpersonal approach to exploring mortality. Rather than trying to eliminate fear, this six-week journey invites you to develop a healthier, more conscious relationship with death—one that leads to greater presence, meaning, and vitality.
Grounded in thanatology, transpersonal psychology, contemplative practice, and meaning-making, this program provides a safe and supportive space to explore your fears while discovering how an awareness of mortality can become a catalyst for living more fully.
What You'll Explore
Week 1: Meeting Your Fear
Develop an understanding of death anxiety, identify personal triggers, and begin exploring how your relationship with mortality influences your life.
Week 2: The Stories We Carry
Examine the cultural, religious, family, and personal beliefs that have shaped your understanding of death and begin discerning which beliefs continue to serve you.
Week 3: Befriending Impermanence
Through mindfulness and contemplative practices, learn to embrace life's constant cycles of change, loss, and renewal with greater acceptance and presence.
Week 4: Meaning, Purpose, and Legacy
Clarify your core values, explore what gives your life meaning, and reflect on the legacy you wish to leave through the way you live today.
Week 5: Death as Teacher
Engage reflective and symbolic practices that invite a deeper dialogue with mortality, transforming fear into wisdom, compassion, and insight.
Week 6: Living Beyond Fear
Integrate the insights gained throughout the program into a personal philosophy of living. Develop practical tools and daily practices that support ongoing peace, resilience, and conscious living.
What You'll Gain
By the end of this six-week journey, you may:
Develop a healthier relationship with death and mortality.
Better understand the roots of your death anxiety.
Cultivate greater emotional resilience and inner peace.
Clarify your values and life priorities.
Learn mindfulness and contemplative practices for navigating uncertainty.
Discover greater meaning, purpose, and gratitude.
Live with increased authenticity, presence, and compassion.
My Approach
Sacred Thanatology integrates contemporary thanatology with transpersonal psychology, contemplative spirituality, Jungian depth psychology, mindfulness, and meaning-centered coaching. Every session honors your unique beliefs, values, and worldview, creating a respectful space for exploration regardless of your religious or spiritual background.
This is not therapy or grief counseling. It is a coaching relationship designed to help you explore your relationship with mortality, deepen self-awareness, and cultivate a more intentional way of living.
Program Includes
Six weekly 90-minute one-on-one coaching sessions
Guided meditations and contemplative practices
Reflective journaling exercises
Personalized integration practices between sessions
Resources for continued learning and reflection
Email support between sessions
Is This Program Right for You?
This program is for individuals who:
Experience anxiety or fear when thinking about death or dying.
Feel overwhelmed by the uncertainty of mortality.
Have experienced loss that has changed their relationship with life.
Desire a deeper spiritual or existential understanding of death.
Want to live with greater purpose, authenticity, and peace.
The Sacred Thanatology Invitation
At the heart of this program is a simple yet profound question:
How might your life change if, instead of fearing death, you allowed your awareness of mortality to become your greatest teacher?
Rather than seeking to eliminate fear, Sacred Thanatology invites participants to meet mortality with courage, curiosity, and compassion—discovering that as our relationship with death changes, our relationship with life is transformed as well. Schedule a complimentary 30-minute consultation to explore whether Sacred Thanatology Coaching is right for you.
A Sacred Thanatology workshop for hospice teams, chaplains, clergy, pastoral care teams, bereavement professionals, volunteers, and helping professionals.
Who holds the grief of those who hold everyone else's?
Those who accompany people through death, dying, grief, and loss carry experiences that often stay with them long after an encounter has ended.
We frequently talk about burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma. We talk much less about vicarious grief—the grief that can emerge through repeatedly witnessing and accompanying the losses of others.
Holding Grief Without Losing Ourselves creates space for caregivers to recognize the grief they carry, reconnect with the meaning of their work, and develop practices for sustainable accompaniment.
The Sacred Thanatology Approach
This experiential workshop brings together contemporary grief theory, transpersonal psychology, spiritual care, and contemplative practice through a simple three-part framework:
WITNESS
Be present without immediately trying to fix.
Learning how to accompany grief through compassionate presence, deep listening, and attention.
DISCERN
What belongs to them? What belongs to me? What belongs to mystery?
Developing greater awareness of the emotional and spiritual boundaries involved in caring for others.
RELEASE
Honor what touched you without carrying everything indefinitely.
Developing contemplative practices and rituals that help caregivers acknowledge and release the grief they encounter through their work.
What We'll Explore
Participants will explore:
• Vicarious grief and how it differs from burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma
• Contemporary approaches to grief, including the Dual Process Model, Continuing Bonds, and Meaning Reconstruction
• Grief as a spiritual, existential, and potentially transformative experience
• Compassionate presence and accompaniment without over-identification
• Spiritual bypassing and the importance of making space for difficult emotions
• Contemplative practices for processing accumulated grief
• Sustainable approaches to caring for others while caring for ourselves
Who This Workshop Is For
Holding Grief Without Losing Ourselves is designed for:
Hospice and palliative care teams
Chaplains and spiritual care departments
Clergy and pastoral staff
Bereavement teams
Parish bereavement and funeral ministries
Social workers and helping professionals
Hospice volunteers
Faith communities and nonprofit organizations
Workshop Formats
90-Minute Introduction
An accessible introduction to vicarious grief and sustainable accompaniment.
Half-Day Workshop
A combination of education, reflection, discussion, and contemplative practice.
Full-Day Workshop or Retreat
A deeper experiential exploration of grief, caregiving, spiritual care, and sustainable accompaniment.
Workshops can be adapted to the particular needs, culture, and spiritual orientation of your organization.
Bring Sacred Thanatology to Your Organization
Caring for people through grief requires more than knowledge and technique. It requires the capacity to remain present to suffering while staying connected to ourselves.
Holding Grief Without Losing Ourselves provides caregivers with space to reflect, reconnect, and develop a more sustainable relationship with the grief they encounter through their work.
Interested in bringing this workshop to your hospice, parish, pastoral team, or organization?
Contact Paul to discuss workshop options and the needs of your team.
About the Facilitator
Paul Miner, MS, CT (Thanatology), MA, is a transpersonal coach, grief educator, meditation teacher, and former Jesuit seminarian. He integrates contemporary grief research, transpersonal psychology, contemplative practice, and depth psychology to help individuals and organizations engage loss, meaning, and transformation with greater wisdom and compassion.
This six-week coaching journey offers a focused and supportive container for engaging grief, life transitions, and existential questions through a transpersonal lens. Each session builds upon the last, allowing for a deepening exploration of your experience while also integrating reflection, practice, and meaning-making between sessions.
Rather than treating grief as something to resolve quickly, this series honors it as a process that unfolds over time—one that invites patience, attention, and compassionate awareness.
Week 1: Orientation & Your Story of Loss
We begin by creating a grounded and compassionate space to understand what brings you here. This session focuses on your current experience of grief or transition, your personal history with loss, and the themes emerging in your life. Together we begin to name what is present without needing to fix or rush it.
Week 2: Understanding Your Grief Landscape
This session explores the many dimensions of grief—emotional, physical, cognitive, relational, and spiritual. We begin to map how grief is showing up in your life and identify patterns, needs, and inner resources already present within your experience.
Week 3: Meaning, Identity, and Life Transitions
Grief often reshapes identity and purpose. This session invites exploration of meaning-making, including how your sense of self, beliefs, and direction in life may be shifting. We gently engage questions of identity, belonging, and becoming.
Week 4: The Inner World – Dreams, Symbols, and the Unconscious
Drawing from Jungian and transpersonal approaches, we explore the symbolic and imaginal dimensions of grief. This may include dreams, imagery, memories, or inner experiences that carry deeper emotional or spiritual significance.
Week 5: Integration, Ritual, and Compassionate Practice
This session focuses on integration—how to live alongside grief in a sustainable and embodied way. We may work with mindfulness practices, rituals, or contemplative tools that support ongoing healing and presence in daily life.
Week 6: Integration, Continuity, and Next Steps
We reflect on your journey over the six weeks, naming what has shifted, softened, or clarified. Together we identify ongoing practices, supports, and directions for continued growth beyond the coaching container.
About This Container
Each session is 60–75 minutes and is tailored to your unique experience. Between sessions, you may be offered reflective prompts, journaling invitations, or contemplative practices to support integration.
This is not a linear process, but a guided unfolding—honoring grief as both deeply human and potentially transformative.
WHO I SUPPORTFor Individuals
Personal coaching for grief, death anxiety, life transitions, and spiritual questioning.
For Organizations
Workshops and formation experiences for teams that accompany grief, suffering, and loss.
OUR APPROACHGrief is not a problem to solve.
Sacred Thanatology brings contemporary grief theory into conversation with contemplative practice, depth psychology, and spiritual wisdom.
This non-pathologizing approach is grounded in accompaniment: witnessing what is present, exploring meaning, and developing practical ways to carry loss while staying connected to life.
Meet Paul Miner, M.A., M.S.
Paul is a thanatologist, transpersonal coach, grief educator, meditation teacher, trained spiritual director, and former Jesuit seminarian. His work integrates contemporary grief research with contemplative practice, depth psychology, and more than fifteen years of experience in spiritual formation and service-centered leadership.
Start a Conversation
Tell me a little about what brings you here, and I’ll respond personally.