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Set YOUR Course in 2025 by Rethinking YOUR Obituary

Writer's picture: Mike FarragherMike Farragher

by Mike Farragher @brainonshmrox

Ever since a friend gifted me the book “Yours Truly: The Obituary Writer’s Guide to Telling Your Story” by James Hagerty, I haven’t been able to stop myself from giving the gift of obituaries to my loved ones! When you hear the word “obituary,” do you lump it in with the maudlin tasks of getting your affairs in order before you tuck in for a long dirt nap? I certainly did. But Hagerty, a Wall Street Journal reporter tasked with writing obituaries for CEOs and custodians alike, views obituaries as an opportunity to unlock the treasures of everyday life.

He dispels the convention that obituaries not just be a chronological inventory of a person’s history in favor of creating a joyride of accomplishments and funny stories that brings that person to life again in the written word. In making the case to write your obituary proactively, he puts people into two camps. For those of us getting closer to moving toward our heavenly reward, he encourages us to take a stab at writing your own one so that you get the final say of your life and don’t leave the task to a family member who is likely in the throes of grief and sadness at the time of your passing. For those of us who have some more road ahead of us, he suggests using the obituary writing process as a measurement tool. It forces you to ask yourself these questions: 

What is my life for? 

What progress have I made so far in fulfilling my life’s intention?

How do I want to be remembered? 


In a recent article in the Opinion section of the The NY Times entitled“Why I Write My Own Obituary Every Year” by Kelly McMasters, she suggests writing your obituary at the end of each year as a way to take stock of your life and create goals for yourself in the months ahead. Always wanted to go to Europe but never got around to it? Put it on that list and insert a funny or poignant memory into next year’s obituary draft! 

 Another unintended benefit to the obituary writing process came when I wrote my parents’ obituary and read it to them. It provided a profoundly moving opportunity to acknowledge them for everything they had done. We laughed, we cried, and then my mother hacked hers up with a red pen. Everyone’s a critic! 

Here’s an excerpt from the obituary I wrote for myself. I hope there is no need to use it anytime soon, but it’s ready to go whenever my Maker books a one way ticket to the Pearly Gates! 


As you’re reading this, Mike Farragher, who died this week at age X, is negotiating the terms of his final reward with one foot jammed in the Pearly Gates.None of this will come as a shock to those who loved him, as he was legendary at winging it and talking himself out of any situation. When combined with a big dollop of Irish luck, it explains an improbably successful career as a VP of Sales in the biotech sector despite logging the lowest organic chemistry grades ever recorded in the history of Monmouth University.He squandered his parents’ investment in higher education with summa cum lucky grades at Monmouth University, his beloved alma mater. Irish immigrants Mike and Eileen Farragher ended up with a sizable return on their overtime pay and grubby dollar diner tips nonetheless: they got a spectacular daughter-in-law in the bargain. Mike and Barbara Miskoff-Farragher’s storybook marriage began on Barbara’s first day at Monmouth and when on to produce Annie and Maura, the light of their lives. A casual relationship with the facts, coupled with an Irishman’s propensity to make a long story longer, allowed Mike to produce 2 Off Broadway plays, a series of short comedy films, and a half dozen books. A dual Irish citizen proud of his heritage, he also wrote for the Irish Voice as a Music Columnist for 18 years. On the “Author Hour” podcast recorded in 2022, Mike said he would “go to his grave remembering the sound of laughter filling a theater from words and scenes that began on my MacBook laptop.” Now that he is in the grave, he is no doubt using those memories as evidence to seal the deal as he attempts to pass by an unconvinced St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. Mike happened upon a painting sold on a NYC street corner that changed the trajectory and purpose of his life in latter years. It depicted a typewriter with the phrase “aspire to inspire others and the universe will take notice” typed on the paper. He spent the rest of his life aspiring to inspire other creatives to tell their story.

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