{"id":7649,"date":"2021-04-19T12:45:09","date_gmt":"2021-04-19T12:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/?p=7649"},"modified":"2021-04-19T15:50:13","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T15:50:13","slug":"the-angel-in-the-room","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2021\/04\/19\/the-angel-in-the-room\/","title":{"rendered":"The Angel In The Room"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dr Helena Dolny \u2013 Reading graduate, international executive coach and finalist in the University of Reading\u2019s just IMAGINE if competition \u2013 talks to CONNECTED about her enterprise LoveLegacyDignity, which aims to transform how we engage with our inevitable mortality.<\/span><\/p>\n

During the pandemic, our mortality has been at the forefront of our minds more than usual, and Dr Dolny\u2019s work to facilitate life-affirming conversations about how we choose to live and questions about how we feel about death, is helping many to cope with living during a pandemic.<\/p>\n

Dr Dolny, who now lives in South Africa, started LoveLegacyDignity<\/a> in 2019 and says she has noticed an increase in clients since the pandemic began:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI\u2019ve noticed that there seems to be more willingness to talk about death and grief in general at the moment. More people are engaging with the resources we provide and I\u2019ve been invited to speak on more radio and TV shows; and these listeners have told me that the virus has made them think about their own mortality.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

CONNECTED talks to Dr Dolny to find out more about her career since leaving Reading, what inspired her to start LoveLegacyDignity and what motivates her to help people have these difficult conversations.<\/p>\n

A vibrant career<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Growing up in a small town in north-east England, Dr Dolny decided to take a gap year volunteering as an assistant teacher in Zambia. This experience sparked Dr Dolny\u2019s interest in rural development which led her to study agricultural economics in Reading\u2019s School of Agriculture, Policy and Development<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"She said: \u201cI chose to study at Reading because it had a strong reputation for agricultural and development economics. I had a wonderful experience there and the course helped me to pursue my interests from my time spent in Zambia.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn graduating from Reading, I went to work in Mozambique\u2019s Ministry of Agriculture for five years where my studies were extremely relevant to the job. I then undertook a PhD on land markets in South Africa. My interest here was piqued by my late husband \u2013 Joe Slovo \u2013 who I\u2019d met in Mozambique, but was a South African in exile.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn 1990, when Nelson Mandela was released, I moved to South Africa with my husband and became an advisor to the Minister of Agriculture and Land Reform. Then, in 1997 I became CEO of the Land Bank where I led the transformation to loan money to black people for the first time in its history since it was formed in 1912.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking for her next career move, Dr Dolny decided to undertake a master\u2019s in coaching, and for the last twenty years she has been an executive coach running her leadership development company called Grey Matters.<\/p>\n

Content in her corporate career, Dr Dolny was keen to find a way to give back to society in the form of pro bono work.<\/p>\n

The fragility of life<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Dr Dolny has lived a life in close proximity to death, as her husband was a prime target on the apartheid hit-list.<\/p>\n

She explains: \u201cLiving my life close to death led me to become comfortable with the subject and aware of the fragility of life.<\/p>\n

\n

“It\u2019s made me realise that people should think carefully about how they\u2019re spending their years and not to put things off \u2013 there isn\u2019t another life when you retire.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cI discovered that I felt at ease sitting with dying people \u2013 offering them some comfort in their last hours \u2013 so I decided to undertake hospice training and also trained as a rites of passage guide.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Mandela died, I wrote a newspaper article headlined \u2018Nation Needs To Be Ready To Let Mandela Go\u2019<\/em> which was hailed as a real piece of thought leadership. I then started a Sunday newspaper series called \u2018Let\u2019s Talk About Dying\u2019, <\/em>and I finished writing a book I\u2019d started about twelve years before called \u2018Before Forever After: When Conversations About Living Meet Questions About Dying\u2019<\/em> which was published in 2017. This was when my career in life coaching came together with what people call death coaching.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the book, I included a set of nine questions to go with the nine themes of the book and people told me I should run workshops on these themes. So I did, creating LoveLegacyDignity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Engaging with mortality<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Dr Dolny shares how LoveLegacyDignity works with individuals to focus on fostering conversations about how we choose to live, and transform how we engage with the ongoing presence of our inevitable mortality.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cWe started with face-to-face classes but transitioned to online classes which expanded our client base beyond South Africa. We now have people attending from the USA, Germany and Australia. We\u2019re about to run our ninth online course and I\u2019m really pleased that the format is working well and has enabled us to remain operational during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cPeople assume my courses are for the elderly, but more often than not younger people also know someone young who has died and this can get them interested in conversations about death.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWe begin with questions such as: if this is the last year of your life, is this how you want to be living it? We also run through different checklists which can help people to prepare for death \u2013 from who you need to forgive, to leaving ordered documents for dependents, to healthcare and advanced directives.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last part we cover is rituals for death. We encourage people to be as specific as possible with their wishes as conflicts in families post-death often happen when those that have passed aren\u2019t specific. For example, I have family who have fallen out over where to bury their mother\u2019s ashes.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThen, on the last day, we encourage people to make a video which accompanies a living will, leaving a message for loved ones to watch after you\u2019ve passed. When I show example videos in our sessions, everyone comments on how beautiful they are to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The Purple File \u2013 Checklist for Checking Out<\/a> is available as a free download.<\/p>\n

Meaningful work<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Dr Dolny\u2019s commitment to LoveLegacyDignity comes across clearly; she does this work because it\u2019s her love and passion and this is her way of giving back to society.\u00a0She said:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI have a rule not to do work that I don\u2019t enjoy and my work has to have meaning. Helping people to navigate tricky conversations about death is satisfying and fulfilling for me.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cOne of the things that really encouraged me to go for it with this venture was the competition the University of Reading ran in 2019 \u2013 just IMAGINE if.<\/em> Presenting my idea to the panellists at Reading was really encouraging. People took it seriously, and although I didn\u2019t win, everyone still encouraged me to pursue my idea.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy motivation comes from helping others. There was one time when I sat with somebody who was dying; he fell asleep and I stayed with him, then an hour later he woke up and I was still there. He said: \u2018It feels like I\u2019ve got an angel in the room\u2019. Who doesn\u2019t want to be the angel in the room?<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cA lot of people get nervous and upset when someone is dying, but sometimes that person just needs you to be quietly with them \u2013 to be the angel in the room.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Find out more about just IMAGINE if<\/a><\/em>, LoveLegacyDignity<\/a> or Dr Dolny<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr Helena Dolny \u2013 Reading graduate, international executive coach and finalist in the University of Reading\u2019s just IMAGINE if competition \u2013 talks to CONNECTED about her enterprise LoveLegacyDignity, which aims to transform how we engage with our inevitable mortality. During the pandemic, our mortality has been at the forefront of our minds more than usual, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":170,"featured_media":7619,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[12,54,85,93,34],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe Angel In The Room - Connected<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Dr Helena Dolny talks to CONNECTED about her enterprise LoveLegacyDignity, which aims to transform how we engage with our inevitable mortality.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2021\/04\/19\/the-angel-in-the-room\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Angel In The Room - Connected\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dr Helena Dolny talks to CONNECTED about her enterprise LoveLegacyDignity, which aims to transform how we engage with our inevitable mortality.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2021\/04\/19\/the-angel-in-the-room\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Connected\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-04-19T12:45:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-04-19T15:50:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/43\/2021\/04\/shutterstock_285580538.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"550\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"juliasmalley\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"juliasmalley\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2021\/04\/19\/the-angel-in-the-room\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2021\/04\/19\/the-angel-in-the-room\/\",\"name\":\"The Angel In The Room - 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