In our programs, you will encounter ideas and perspectives on what is a completed life and how we can direct end of life choices. We feature pioneering advocates, award-winning artists, and esteemed lawyers, physicians, and academics.
The Completed Life Initiative offers three podcast series. Voices of the Completed Life will highlight the lives and work of those who are exploring End of Life options. Gifts of the Completed Life will include reflections and interviews with authors, artists, physicians and philosophers who help us explore the many ways of answering, “What is a Completed Life?” Lexicon of Life and Death is a series in which Lynn and Mark Barger Elliott explore vocabulary we employ to express beliefs, hopes, and attitudes towards life and death.
Live from 10 Grand Central is a new event series that will debut on Thursday, May 16, 2024 with special guest Catharine DeLong. We will screen the first episode of Death Differently, a cinematic education series highlighting alternative approaches to death, dying, and grief. CLI is pleased to offer Live from 10 Grand Central from our new offices in midtown Manhattan. Our building, Energy Star-compliant and sustainable, located between Grand Central Terminal and the United Nations, underscoring CLI’s desire that our mission impacts our nation and world as we seek to provide a space that brings people together to reflect on how to live better and to die well.
We invite you to join us for Last Hellos: New Models in Global End of Life Care, a Global Symposium on June 20-21, 2024, which will span four continents and feature speakers worldwide as they explore new models in end-of-life care. From the origin of what it means to be “palliative” in the context of Aboriginal communities to the scientific inquiry into the effect of placebos; from research into personal narratives of end-of-life visions to expanding eligibility considerations for medical aid-in-dying in Colorado, this two-day Symposium invites you to contemplate one of life’s most powerful transformative experiences.
The Indigenous End of Life Symposium, coming up on March 21st, 2024, aimed to elevate and amplify Indigenous and Aboriginal end-of-life experiences from around the world. This Symposium offered a platform for individual speakers from these communities to offer direct narratives about traditional dying ritual practices. Our speakers also reflected on how we can ensure that Indigenous communities, nations, and territories worldwide receive the recognition they deserve, especially in crucial areas like end-of-life healthcare. Additionally, they shared the challenges and opportunities they face as they interact with health systems and key elders and advisors in their communities.
The Faith Sommerfield Memorial Lecture was established at Columbia University School of Professional Studies in partnership with the Program in Bioethics in early 2023 to commemorate the life of Faith Sommerfield, the late Founder of the Completed Life Initiative. The inaugural lecture on September 21st, 2023, featured the renowned philosopher Peter Singer.
The Completed Life Initiative Film Festival is not your ordinary film event. The first festival on August 19th, 2023 featured a selection of award-winning and nominated feature films and documentaries – Moon Manor, Jack Has a Plan, and Last Flight Home – an insightful Q&A with director Ondi Timoner, and the presentation of the first Completed Life Initiative Pioneer Award to Lynda Bluestein.
The theme of our 4th annual Fall Conference was “Living Well, Dying Better.” Our speaker lineup featured a New York Times bestselling author, a Mexican Death Doula, a Pulitzer Prize winner, a Vermont doctor and expert in Medical Aid-in-Dying, a Bay Area award-winning filmmaker and palliative care doctor, an English undertaker, an expert on medical law and clinical ethics, and the Completed Life Initiative Courage Award winner. You can watch all sessions from the conference, held November 1-3rd, 2023, including keynote speaker, Amy Bloom.
The Friends of the Completed Life Initiative are the first to learn when we announce new programs, events, podcasts, and more. They receive bi-weekly updates to their inbox and enjoy exclusive access to our frequent Friends of CLI events. These gatherings are an opportunity to connect with our community in-person while enjoying food, drinks, socializing with like-minded peers, and watching a show, film, exploring a museum, or engaging in a thought-provoking conversation about what it means to live a completed life.
The living room is the hub of many of our homes – the space where we celebrate holidays, announce new relationships, entertain guests, and plan our futures. Join us for great food, beverages and living room conversations about what it means to live a completed life and how to direct our end-of-life decisions.
The Completed Life Initiative offers three podcast series. Voices of the Completed Life will highlight the lives and work of those who are exploring End of Life options. Gifts of the Completed Life will include reflections and interviews with authors, artists, physicians and philosophers who help us explore the many ways of answering, “What is a Completed Life?” Lexicon of Life and Death is a series in which Lynn and Mark Barger Elliott explore vocabulary we employ to express beliefs, hopes, and attitudes towards life and death.
Live from 10 Grand Central is a new event series that will debut on Thursday, May 16, 2024 with special guest Catharine DeLong. We will screen the first episode of Death Differently, a cinematic education series highlighting alternative approaches to death, dying, and grief. CLI is pleased to offer Live from 10 Grand Central from our new offices in midtown Manhattan. Our building, Energy Star-compliant and sustainable, located between Grand Central Terminal and the United Nations, underscoring CLI’s desire that our mission impacts our nation and world as we seek to provide a space that brings people together to reflect on how to live better and to die well.
We invite you to join us for Last Hellos: New Models in Global End of Life Care, a Global Symposium on June 20-21, 2024, which will span four continents and feature speakers worldwide as they explore new models in end-of-life care. From the origin of what it means to be “palliative” in the context of Aboriginal communities to the scientific inquiry into the effect of placebos; from research into personal narratives of end-of-life visions to expanding eligibility considerations for medical aid-in-dying in Colorado, this two-day Symposium invites you to contemplate one of life’s most powerful transformative experiences.
The Indigenous End of Life Symposium, coming up on March 21st, 2024, aimed to elevate and amplify Indigenous and Aboriginal end-of-life experiences from around the world. This Symposium offered a platform for individual speakers from these communities to offer direct narratives about traditional dying ritual practices. Our speakers also reflected on how we can ensure that Indigenous communities, nations, and territories worldwide receive the recognition they deserve, especially in crucial areas like end-of-life healthcare. Additionally, they shared the challenges and opportunities they face as they interact with health systems and key elders and advisors in their communities.
The Faith Sommerfield Memorial Lecture was established at Columbia University School of Professional Studies in partnership with the Program in Bioethics in early 2023 to commemorate the life of Faith Sommerfield, the late Founder of the Completed Life Initiative. The inaugural lecture on September 21st, 2023, featured the renowned philosopher Peter Singer.
The Completed Life Initiative Film Festival is not your ordinary film event. The first festival on August 19th, 2023 featured a selection of award-winning and nominated feature films and documentaries – Moon Manor, Jack Has a Plan, and Last Flight Home – an insightful Q&A with director Ondi Timoner, and the presentation of the first Completed Life Initiative Pioneer Award to Lynda Bluestein.
The theme of our 4th annual Fall Conference was “Living Well, Dying Better.” Our speaker lineup featured a New York Times bestselling author, a Mexican Death Doula, a Pulitzer Prize winner, a Vermont doctor and expert in Medical Aid-in-Dying, a Bay Area award-winning filmmaker and palliative care doctor, an English undertaker, an expert on medical law and clinical ethics, and the Completed Life Initiative Courage Award winner. You can watch all sessions from the conference, held November 1-3rd, 2023, including keynote speaker, Amy Bloom.
The Friends of the Completed Life Initiative are the first to learn when we announce new programs, events, podcasts, and more. They receive bi-weekly updates to their inbox and enjoy exclusive access to our frequent Friends of CLI events. These gatherings are an opportunity to connect with our community in-person while enjoying food, drinks, socializing with like-minded peers, and watching a show, film, exploring a museum, or engaging in a thought-provoking conversation about what it means to live a completed life.
The living room is the hub of many of our homes – the space where we celebrate holidays, announce new relationships, entertain guests, and plan our futures. Join us for great food, beverages and living room conversations about what it means to live a completed life and how to direct our end-of-life decisions.
The Completed Life Initiative
155 E. 44th Street, 10th Floor
New York, NY 10017
1-929-456-8008
[email protected]
© Completed Life Initiative. All rights reserved, 2023.