Emily Cummin: Why We're So Afraid to Talk About Death

What if our fear of death is stopping us from living more fully?

In this episode, I sit down with Emily Cummin, founder and CEO of Untangle, a grief support platform helping people feel less alone after loss. Through her work, Emily has supported people in 138 countries and is helping change one of society's most difficult conversations.

In this episode, Emily shares why grief is not something to fix, but a natural human response to loss. We explore why talking about death remains so uncomfortable, what our growing obsession with longevity reveals about our relationship with mortality, and how making space for grief can help us better understand ourselves and each other.

This is a conversation about grief, mortality and what it truly means to live well.

You can find our more about Untangle here: https://untanglegrief.com/

Transcript

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death is the only certainty in life right it's like the ultimate human fear and reminder that life is finite and you only get one life so I think people are scared of confronting their own mortality and I think it's quite interesting that such a big longevity movement has emerged look at people like Brian Johnson that is ultimately people trying to fight death and rather than talking about death let's have conversations about it let's talk about grief we've kind of gone the other way where there's lots of people trying to say let's let's just conquer it today my guest is Emily Cummins founder and CEO of untangle a grief support platform helping people feel less alone after loss grief is not a mental health condition it is a human natural response to loss and actually giving people a space to talk about that there's not that many places that exist like that Emily's work has reached people in 138 countries been recognized by Technation's Rising Stars and helped open up one of the conversations that society still finds hardest to have death is such a leveler people that would probably hate each other and argue in any other space when they're talking about grief and the pain of that are just two people humans that have experienced loss I think the beauty of being human is that we do die and I think by fighting that you're you're fundamentally denying a part of what it means to be alive there's a bit of a void at the moment and we're not sure how to fill it welcome Emily thank you for having me I'm it's great to be here and talk about this yeah it's great to have you here um what made me think it would be good to do an episode with you um I was actually chatting to my sister she's a doctor and she was saying you should do a podcast about death because it happens all of the time there's a doctor you see all the time but nobody talks about it and so maybe that's a place to start um you know it's a it's a topic people don't talk about it seems to be a taboo and um um it's a subject that you're an expert in maybe you could tell us uh tell us why you think that is it definitely is a taboo and it's interesting cause one of the challenges initially I thought well let's get all of society talking about death and actually what I've realized over time is it's much easier to get the people who've experienced death talking to each other because we I think are scared of talking about death cause we think some somehow it will happen to us or big like bring bad luck and I think people are quite superstitious and with fearful as well I mean death is the only certainty in life right it's like the ultimate human fear and reminder that life is finite and you only get one life and so I think people are are just scared of confronting their own mortality and I think it's quite interesting that such a big longevity movement has emerged and you know you look at people like Brian Johnson and you know that is ultimately people trying to fight death and rather than talking about let's talk about death let's have conversations about it let's talk about grief you know we've kind of gone the other way where there's lots of people trying to say let's let's let's just conquer it let's talk about immortality upload our brains onto a computer exactly so I think that's why yeah it's it's still such a taboo and your business untangle has clearly done extraordinarily well hundred and thirty eight countries lots of accolades and recognition um could you tell us a little bit more about about what untangle does so I started untangle after my grandpa died and I the oldest daughter oldest grandchild um stepped in actually my parents were getting divorced as well so kind of stepped in to help everyone um and it was I kind of found none of my friends have gone through a loss so I had no one to talk to about it and I saw that with my grandma and all other family members like everyone was grieving differently there was loads of admin to do and they just didn't really seem to be a place to go there were kind of a few great charities but I kind of you know didn't really want to reach out to a charity and I thought well wouldn't it be great if there was a place that kind of you can go to you can get support you can talk to other people going through something similar feel less alone and that kind of holds your hand through a lot of the admin which is very overwhelming as well so that was kind of the the beginning of untangle and and mainly now we're a peer to peer support community so we have lots of moderated chat groups based on you know who died how they died when they died um who you are as a person so if you're young maybe you're caring for kids there's support groups for you um and we do video support groups and then we work with trusted selected partners who can support with this kind of services along the way as well I guess for lots and lots of people they've not been able to find anything like this elsewhere what about the the services that you're introducing them to through that what sort of things is it that people are looking for to to to to be to be fixed up to before untangle came along you know people were already using these services so planning funerals normally they're going through probate um you know£1 trillion of assets moves from generation to generation every year in the UK so it's an enormous market there's lots of inheritance tax to pay there's lots of legalities um and typically people spend about £12,000 on a death um and so there's there was a lot of people doing these things but they're doing them um maybe you know with with a solicitor they'd never met before or trying to do it themselves and unsure whether they're doing it right um it's quite hard to find a therapist I mean some amazing kind of therapy platforms have emerged but actually when you're grieving and you've you know it's normally the first or second time maybe that you've gone through a loss and you're very overwhelmed you know you don't want to be thinking about all of the kind of admin and trying to find a trusted service and am I being ripped off and who should I speak to so what we do is we connect people to you know whether it's a a probate lawyer who specialises in someone who was a company director or um a therapist that might understand a strange relationships so and that's you know we work with all different partners and we're careful with who we work with and the idea is that we can get you the right help for you at the right time but you're not being kind of overwhelmed or bombarded and I think that is really important but the main thing that people really come to us for is this kind of peer to peer support group because actually you know grief is not a mental health condition it is a human natural response to loss and actually giving people a space to talk about that openly it doesn't there's not that many places that exist like that and we don't shy away from you know letting people talk about the really hard stuff so and it was obviously a bit of a challenge like one of the big things for me when we first started was making sure that we had our safeguarding set up and that we had our moderation and you know that we're not a crisis service but that we can kind of triage people who are in crisis yep lots of people lose a sense of purpose their identity their belief system you know maybe their financial security when someone dies and that can make you feel like you know you don't want to wake up in the morning yeah and that's a hard thing to admit to friends to family to people that love you so we try and create a space where people can say those things and it's OK and you know we're not trying to fix you it's just a space to acknowledge those things as well I mean and there's lots of funny ridiculous humorous parts of grief so it's not all incredibly dark but it's a real range um yeah the kind of the the peer to peer community and the services that people are are getting just by speaking with one another that sounds like that is a bit of a minefield for you to have to navigate as you as you work out how are you gonna moderate the groups what are the things that you're going to um uh allow for in those groups what are the things that are not really um within the professional boundaries of what you're trying to do and um how have you how have you worked through that cause that must have been a learning journey for you it has been and we're still learning and we don't get it right always I think is the first thing to say yeah one of the advantages of us being a kind of startup you know my backgrounds in business strategy and product development I haven't come from a clinical setting yeah so you know maybe I was slightly more naive or risk of us or less risk of us but in a way that's enabled us to try things out and test them so there is an element of being able to kind of play and explore and say listen we're not we're not gonna get this right always um but this is we're doing our best but the way I actually started was I set up a meetup group um so a bereavement meetup group and actually a divorce and separation meetup group initially cause eventually we'd love to support people for all different types of challenges but um and we used to meet in pubs in person I book a pub a table for 10 and wait and the first few I honestly sat at these huge tables and you know the bartender would come over and say oh I'm sorry your friends aren't here would you like a free drink or do you want me to take some chairs and tables away yeah um but carried on doing this and stuck it out and eventually we had this um I think we grew to the biggest bereavement and divorce uh support groups in person in the UK and we had kind of local chapters different people around them um and what kind of developed from doing that and just chatting with people was a bit of a methodology for you know what might people want to talk about how do we facilitate conversations um and give people a space that feels safe and doesn't feel give them as you know people don't feel pressured to share but they can if they want to and so a bit of trial and error through kind of facilitating those and you get all different personalities from all different places all different losses um and and you know you're trying to balance that mm hmm and through kind of that and then and then we kind of tested with WhatsApp groups and um you know an Instagram community and each time we've kind of tweaked it and tweaked it and you know challenges have arisen and we respond to those as they come and then we update our policies so I guess it's it's been a test and learn in the same way as you would with any kind of sure start up or or new business um but making sure we do have like full backs uh for safeguarding and the community is also amazing like they support each other they moderate to some extent themselves you know that that there is an element of goodwill I think that comes with on tangle yeah um so so that's been great as well a question that I've got here because um my sort of default would be OK in a grieving situation people will rely on their families and loved ones around them to support through that difficult time but this sounds like it's going way beyond that and people are talking to strangers what where where's that need coming from what what's happening but people aren't getting what they need within their within their closer circles maybe after the funeral and yeah you know their friends have started to forget about what's happened but with their own families I'm wondering why why they need this yeah it's a good question I mean not everyone does and but one of the big I mean lots of people say after kind of few weeks after the funeral support drops off you know no one asks about it and this goes back to your first question about grief and death being a taboo um often people don't wanna bring up the person who's died like a friend might not want to cause they don't wanna remind you actually a lot of the time that person doesn't need reminding that their like mum died actually they'd love to be able to talk about them yeah so um so often there's not a space to talk about it with friends people change the subject and then with family um everyone grieves differently even within a whole family you know everyone's relationship will be different their attachment styles are different and because of that it can be quite difficult if anything a lot of people have described it you know can feel quite lonely being with your family you know they're the people closest to you maybe they know that knew that person really well yeah and yet you're all having a very different experience you maybe one person really wants to talk about them all the time and someone else actually would rather not and and that tension can mean that people sometimes look you know for another community to grieve in and the other thing is sometimes you don't want to kind of burden your family or worry them uh and and we know we've heard that a lot especially people who've lost a partner and maybe with and they've got kids and they you know they want to hold space for their teenage children's grief and so they're looking for somewhere else to be able to kind of talk about the things that they're finding difficult so there's lots of reasons um and sometimes it's it's just nice to talk to strangers that don't know you they don't judge you you know they don't they don't care and I mean they do care but actually it's it's a sometimes can be quite refreshing to uh to be able to just talk really openly and so that's kind of the needs that untangle fills and it it's not a reflection on the fact that that family or friends aren't great it's just they might not understand what you're going through and you might want to find some people that do and that's that's okay you know and they're probably in a shared experience cause they're going through something similar and so they're more open to it I was interested in something you said right at the start about how some people think um perhaps talking about death might also be unlucky in a way that was a word you chose yeah um that's obviously part of this people not wanting to kind of enter into the conversation what what do you mean when you talk about that I think there's a bit of superstition around death um you know if if you talk about it it's gonna happen to you um and and we've seen also even people who have terminal illnesses sometimes you know we have an anticipatory grief group so someone who either themselves or their loved ones knows that they're terminal and they join the group for support and sometimes people don't like to talk about dying because it makes it more real and so I think yeah we're a bit superstitious we avoid it it's uncomfortable but ultimately the underlying thing is fear um you know fear that it will happen to me or my loved one you you don't it's not nice hearing about someone else's pain no and knowing that that could happen to you because I I think there's there's a lot of kind of just bad and good luck in life um and you know we try and find meaning in these things and purpose and you know there's there's definitely value to kind of understanding and but sometimes it is just bad luck and I I think that that's quite scary to to be confronted with like as a human we we think we're in control of our lives and our loved ones and you know we take things for granted and actually you know bad things happen all the time and it's it's just terrible luck and on the flip side though that makes me and I think a lot of people that have gone through a loss feel like you know how we are also very lucky to be alive and yeah to for the people that we love to be alive and um to have those relationships and so on the flip side it does make you want to live life well gives you a different a different outlook because you're being confronted by something yeah exactly yeah um I mean my own experience um in our family when um when we had unexpected loss um was that it was interesting to see how some people we knew would come and be very they'd be very approachable and they'd want to ask and others then we just didn't hear from for for for you know a long time and another thing which I noticed as well as there's like maybe it's a generational thing but there's a more traditional um stiff upper lip let's not talk about it and everyone just you know smile and pretend nothing's happened going on there as well so I can sort of relate to the things you're talking about and that she that um thing of you know never hearing from people again sometimes people say you know a friend doesn't message them and then you get too uncomfortable and awkward you're like oh no I that person's parent died and I didn't message them and then time goes on and then that you go into those kind of guilty cycles and then you think actually it's best to just not say anything it's been so long yeah um I would say to that actually that most people on the other the receiving end would rather someone even if it was a year or two years later acknowledged it and said listen I'm really sorry I didn't know what to say and you know I'm and and like acknowledge that person has someone has died yeah um yeah that would be my my takeaway from that speaking from experience I would agree that would be great if people did that more um and then there's there's the there's the tricky business of work as well um when somebody loses somebody and the you know they've still got uh they still got work to do work's kind of a a Polish professional uh experience environment and then the the kind of the the raw and extreme emotions of of grief don't easily mix what do good employers do and and what do you also see that that that is getting discussed in your communities where it's not working hmm um yeah it's it's interesting with work because for some people actually through going into work and throwing themselves in can actually be really helpful and for others you know they they've got brain fog there's lots of physical symptoms of grief as well and they can't concentrate and I think what's the point in this why am I sitting this meeting you know my life partner just dropped dead yeah and so so I think acknowledging one of the things that employers that are kind of supporting people do well is acknowledge that everyone's um experience of grief is gonna be different and sometimes it comes years later as well it might be that this is a bit of a generalization but there might be another loss that happens later on maybe a beloved like family pet dies or a cousin or someone who's you know a friend who was the same age as a as my parent that can trigger um grief from you know a a past grief um so employers that kind of support people well acknowledge that so sometimes they give a flexible bereavement leave so you know you have X amount of time but you can take it in different chunks at different points so you know maybe on the lead up to the death anniversary or their birthday um or it might be that uh it's not the funeral that you know that's the hardest or maybe it's it's the funeral that's hard but it's actually my kid's first birthday without their father that's gonna be difficult so um flexible bereavement leave that gives people a kind of entitlement to take it at different points through the year that's such a good idea um yeah I mean I think it's actually in general quite a good kind of wellness policy um to give people kind of agency over uh within reason over that time off yeah um and then the other thing is letting people self define um who qualifies and I think gosh I should have checked this before I came but that the latest government um bereavement policy does include this that um cause we they've just updated the bereavement policies um but you can self define um who who counts as a a kind of a close loved one yes um because you know lots of people being raised by different family members or friends um and that death can be more impactful than someone that you know is deemed a a kind of next of kin so letting people self define and also just acknowledging it and asking them how they want to be treated as well and checking in on that because one of the things someone in our community said that they an email had gone out their partner died from cancer and an email had been sent by HR a well meaning email to everyone in the company saying that so and So's partner had lost their battle with cancer and and she said well that's really language I hate like he wasn't he didn't he wasn't fighting a battle when he lost and cancer won like he was ill and you know he he was very um kind of brave and uh and handled it with Grace you know throughout and the idea that he kind of lost his battle is is not language that is reflective of how I feel and it she's like it just felt a bit uncomfortable everyone in the organization getting this email so kind of checking the communication with them what they want communicated how um just really simple things but actually they can make a really big difference and easy to get wrong coming back to the point before that if people are finding it hard to have a conversation engage there's that like difficulty to talk to somebody who's grieving that it may just be that the company try and do something that's well meaning without consulting hmm and um you know uh so that's good advice for for all businesses yeah yeah and I think also as a business you need to drive it so give them options um rather than saying what would you like um you know and and even if you've got not got a lot of options that you offer in your policies just sitting someone down saying we can you know this is available to you or we can communicate this or we can say to the team um you know not to bring it up but you'll bring it up first cause sometimes it can be hard you come back you know if on the other extreme people have come back to work and said their first like week every single first person they saw was like I'm so sorry I heard you know I heard your parent died actually at some point they're like I'm just trying to do my job like yeah so again it's like getting that balance um but give someone options and let them choose rather than putting the kind of mental load onto them to suggest things yes now talking of balance changing topics slightly what is the balance you look for in your business when you're trying to create your business model around a company and there are vulnerable people at a difficult point in their life and there are services that they need and you have the facility and you're being kind of put on the platform to offer those services that's a very difficult thing to do as a founder and so I'm interested in how you how you make those decisions hmm I haven't always got it right it's the answer and probably haven't who does move through it um fast enough and um it's been a challenge to be honest uh there's a lot of kind of money in the death space and people are already spending money on very kind of fragmented services so there's there was always an opportunity like a commercial opportunity here um and that was one of the reasons I thought actually there's I wanted to build in the space cause it you know you can help people and take money that's being spent maybe on poor services or badly made choices and maybe reduce the cost for individuals but capture some some of that um in one place in reality um we've tried a couple of different business models um so we have a kind of direct consumer subscription and we've kept it as a kind of low cost as possible um so it's £4 99 a month and really kind of accessible price point and the and that kind of covers the business but it ultimately was not quite the right model for us to kind of scale up and so this is why we now work with partners um and and I think there's an interesting kind of tension there between wanting to make sure we only work with the right partners and but then also thinking about OK well what what does this commercial arrangement look like and where we've landed is you know if it's the best thing for the customer then it will ultimately be best thing for the business so um we often work on a revenue share basis which which is much harder as a business model cause it means that essentially our partners have to be delivering great you know service yeah and convert the customer you're taking all the risk on their level of service in order to actually get paid exactly rather than being a lead gen business and then then it becomes a kind of death funnel really where you're trying to you know maximize people at the top of that funnel which um is a tricky place to be yeah for sure and I think that's a bit of a tension point that we're exploring at the moment um which is you know rather than being lead gen potentially we work with a few trusted partners on a longer term basis where um they have access to our community we can kind of help um use all our knowledge and insight to help them understand how to go to market um and how to reach customers and talk to customers um in a way that is in the right kind of tone and you know we reach 10 million people a month organically across our community um and so we have you know quite a good path for them to reach these people at a very sensitive time so it's trying to find that balance and I think that um I've probably erred on the side of of prioritising kind of the integrity of of the support for our members and I think that is all will always be true um but I don't think that they're in conflict and one of the things I realized over time more and more is that you know if it if it does the business model doesn't make sense and you can't provide the service no and uh so it's all very well and good having this lovely thing yeah but if you can't find a way of funding it then it doesn't work and you know that's that's attention um and I think what's difficult and a lot of our members are in the US and they're much more used to paying for services particularly in the healthcare the mental health space um not that we are directly either of those um but it has it's meant that we've had less kind of resistance whereas in the UK you know at the early days we got a couple of really angry one star reviews that said how dare you capitalize on my grief um and it's because a lot of the services are provided either you know by public health or through charities and so people aren't used to paying for them and so it was trying to kind of balance that and kind of educate people on well this is what you get and this is this is the comparison so still to be honest with you playing with the business model and there's definitely more more to do and more to explore definitely a strong argument to say that because you're in the middle of this space which most of society doesn't want to look at you will at least know what good looks like and you will have seen it all you know good bad and indifferent and so you know um maybe there's nothing wrong with monetizing that knowledge cause you know you're gonna get people a good service is anybody sort of setting a level of standards like there's you know consumer associations or in in this country or in the US is anyone trying to actually kind of say this is what the standard should be there was um Vicky Wilson um made a bereavement standard um so there was something that was uh rolled out but I don't know if it's been like there has been some adoption um but it's not you know there's not like a B core equivalent that is really really widely recognized and I think that would be a good thing for you know there was a working group that the government had around this and did you do some work I can't remember if you did some work I've not only worked in it I have um I have discussed it before with people in the industry as as you mentioned Vicky and I had a conversation with about it when when she was involved in in in the Bereavement Standard um but um my experience is very shallow in this area so I I I can't give you any any depth on it yeah no I think there's there's definitely more work to do but this goes back to our earlier point that people don't like talking about death yeah and dying and in the um Vulnerable Consumers Act uh bereaved consumers mm hmm now qualify as well and so companies do have to make sure that you know if you're calling up Vodafone to cancel your parents phone contract because they died that they have a level of care and support for that customer so there is some incentive from that perspective but there isn't really a kind of I'd say nationally or internationally recognized standard right um and I think part of the reason is because people I don't like talking and thinking about it I don't like thinking about it and talking about it as you said in this country$1 trillion is passing trillion pounds is passing between generations each year so it's sort of from a from a pure sort of start up point of view you would say you know your total addressable market is is is huge and at the same time I don't see or hear about um let's say technology advancing in the same pace as we see in so many other areas at the moment right so from a a data and technology point of view um what does what does good look like in terms of supporting um this sector there have been there's been kind of waves of tech companies you know including on tangle trying to help people at this time um and it's an interesting question of like what's what's working what's not working there's a there's a company in the US um that provide bereavement support to employees um through insurance companies and employers OK and you know they've they've grown a lot so I think that there is a um there are some companies getting traction in the space tech companies uh but I think in reality I mean funeral funerals are very localized business right like you have a body you need to dispose of them um and direct cremation is growing so that's when you you know you essentially send a body off they cremate them and return the ashes and then you can do a kind of yeah memorize that person whatever way you want so that's maybe less localized way of doing a funeral but but it's quite localized that business and then I I think that the um the tech kind of challenge is they've just introduced digital death certificates the first time um so that's great and that does open some doors but essentially it's a very paper based industry and it's very regulated you know you're talking to people's banks um where they have kind of subscriptions their insurance policies um so so to kind of access and talk to all those people and make sure that there's no fraud happening uh is quite difficult and the reality is um where the money sits is basically funerals and financial and legal services around the estate yeah um and there are you know some businesses doing great work in specifically those things um and digitizing those processes but often uh providing serve um digital kind of tools to you know lawyers and law firms who are essentially the front people for that rather than direct to consumer so there is there's a there is some work happening but I think like where we are for example it's like helping you with that process closing accounts or um providing emotional support people aren't spending money there and so there isn't necessarily commercial um opportunity direct to consumer and so you know the way some businesses have gone around this is well if you've got an insurance policy do you have an insurance policy alongside it and so you know that that would be one route uh to go down um from a a tech perspective you're wanting to make sure that people's very sensitive data is protected and that's of course and that's the challenge and and I think what we've done very well is because we have this active community we have a lot and lot of a data points on like who people are and where that what their concerns are what they're talking about um and there's a challenge of you know protecting the kind of privacy of our community with what you do with that data as well so yeah um the way we're using it is to match them to the right service at the right time you know at the right price point but that's um you know other people might do other things with that data and you know that's I I do think something that's interesting in a kind of world of AI where the the kind of admin processes you know potentially you can talk to Claude or chat GPT and get them to you know I wouldn't recommend it but they could help you and coach you through that process um I I think we're gonna have this kind of split slightly tangential tangential answer but where we've got lots of AI agents that help us do certain things yes and then we'll want to then talk to real humans that you know whether that's for product reviews or because we're feeling lonely um or because we really like a certain musician and they do too and I I think the value of community and peer to peer conversation is gonna increase once um we've kind of streamlined so much with AI once the administration sides are taken care of then the actual human side can get access to the things or people can get access to the things they need through other people yeah um while you're talking about all of that I was I was starting to think about Wills I I got you probably got information on it I've no idea but I would imagine it's one of those things everyone should have a will but not enough people do them for the reasons we've talked about and they just don't want to think about it um I'm imagining from a data and digital living we're all becoming more complicated our our kind of the roots we're putting down in the world are more and more complex than they were in the past where you know assets were much simpler I think about the amount of accounts and subscriptions you mentioned as well so I was wondering is there a responsibility on the individuals um who know all of us uh we're alive and we are not thinking about how we make those preparations so of course you know for uh the the loved ones that are trying to sort out an estate that's one thing but should more people be you know using tools and therefore driving that market to create more tools to manage to manage um you know what happens when they're gone yeah definitely um I think the latest stat was that 45% of the population have a will OK um don't quote me on that but and you can make a will for free so there is a an emotional barrier to making a will it's the easiest thing you can do to protect your loved ones I would recommend everyone does it um but to your point the best thing you can do is you know create a whether it's digitally or it's on a folder whatever it looks like a place that says these are all the things you need to know and uh there are some services that exist we work with a partner that helps you create like a digital vault and to store kind of all your accounts and logins um so that your beneficiaries or loved ones next of kin can access them after you die I mean companies could offer that to employees couldn't they yeah for sure because of my I work in tech so my immediate thing is is it secure because you're kind of putting you know everything in there if there are again from a business like yours recommended services that are actually decent if there are services like that out there then um you know employers could say to their employees here's stuff you could be using mm hmm for sure yeah definitely and I think that that is kind of the route to market for a lot of uh digital kind of uh bolts that exist and and there's a kind of you know creating a digital doing a will power of attorney and and also thinking about like financial planning as well so you know you want to do that early to make sure the estate doesn't put them in a big kind of pickle for one of a better term so you know there needs to be enough liquidity as well to pay things like inheritance tax so um there's lots of things you can think about in advance and I recommend people to do that for sure um it's like the most loving thing you can do for your loved ones is to kind of make it easy for them so they can focus on grieving you and and not having to do you know finding hunting down subscriptions and hunting down accounts I mean in a weird way there is there is some positive to everything moving digitally which is that you can actually see you know what subscriptions and payments are coming out of people's accounts so there's there's a positive there the question is like how do you locate lots of assets um you might have multiple accounts um so there's there's that question and there are we work with a partner that does help you search for um for different assets um in different places and different countries and wherever else um I've started to hear more over the last couple of years about something which I guess the category might be called grief bots and this idea of rather than you know when somebody is died trying to in some way bring them bring them back resurrect them through data and tone of voice and even voice and that sort of thing um what do you think about that I don't think it's intrinsically bad people trying to feel connected to their loved one um but I think when when it creates a false sense of continued relationship that actually means you know it's very comforting but it means that you don't maybe fully accept that they've died and the result of that actually makes it harder for you to move forwards and you know I don't think I think we live with grief our whole lives you know you can continue to love and grieve someone your whole life you can remarry and still love and grieve your your previous partner you it doesn't go but I think the idea that you're maintaining a relationship with them that's two way is unhelpful and um you know I'm I'm quite sceptical haven't actually said this on a podcast before but like about mediums as well and there's a big market for mediums and psychics and I think that there's you know maybe it if it can give someone closure as a kind of one or twice of thing then fine but like I think just anything that maintains a false relationship uh I don't think that that is the best way to go and I think that sometimes can be quite exploitative when someone's vulnerable and they're desperate and they're looking for connection and they're paying for the service yeah I think there's a there's been an amazing growth of businesses that ask people to like question so you whilst you're still alive you record stories and um and different you know aspects of your life and then your love after you die your loved ones get that and they can listen to it and read it or watch it I think that's lovely like that is a way of having a connection with someone that is is true to something they've created um but yeah I I I don't particularly you know in the same way that I actually I think kind of having like proto social relationships with chatbots is um can also be damaging you know I I think when there's a purpose you know if you're talking to an AI and you're using it to kind of coach you through something I can see the value in that but if when you start to kind of ascribe value to it as its own individual that's uh I don't know maybe I'll think differently in 10 years but that's that's my view I think it's one of those subjects that's um it is still evolving but it's it's fundamentally quite an ethical question um so I heard one founder sort of describe it in terms of you know their rights their human rights um it's not that different actually from people saying I want to live forever by uploading my brain to a computer but this this founder was saying well you know it's my right not to grieve because I want to um I I want to get on and enjoy my life and that's why I've built a system that can take someone's you know all of the the data about someone's mother and then and create a bot that means that that person can still feel connected and they'll never have to go through the grief process and they thought that that was sort of uh evolution in a good way so same as the longevity movement it's like let's try and fight death rather than accept it and that's fine you know if someone wants to live like that that's their choice but I think the beauty of being human is I'm not saying anyone should go through immense pain and suffering but we are human and part of the the reason with you know what makes us human is that we do die and I think by fighting that you're you're fundamentally denying a part of what it means to be alive and so you know may maybe that is a a way that some people would choose to to live but I guess that's not how I would and I I think my observation is that it's OK and a good thing if people start to come to terms with death we used to say untangle helps people rebuild life after loss you know that I think if you can start to rebuild your life even if it looks different and it's not how you wanted it to be and it's not the first choice life I think that's a positive thing you've had a very unique insight and continue to um into the space which people don't talk about what has um running on untangle and being involved in grief maybe taught you about life and your own beliefs in life and and maybe your beliefs in the afterlife as well I mean it's easy for me to like sit here and say all this in theory like in reality I just live my life like everyone else you know I have days when I feel shit and I don't wanna get out you know don't wanna do the things and go to the gym and you know I'm not embracing every moment you know like I'm human and um and I also think that you know you can understand grief and intellectually and have been close to it but I still think that you know if my partner dropped dead tomorrow I would be in excruciating pain and grief so um in some sense nothing but one of the the things I find really I'll come back to myself in a second but in the untangle community we have people from all different kind of walks of life political extremes and I you know I know this cause I see sometimes on our Instagram people that follow us and comment and engage and like they'll have certain political flags or um you know like slogans and things in their profile pictures and so you you can see there's a huge huge range of people but actually that never comes up in our support groups because death is such a leveler so people that would probably hate each other and argue in any other space when they're talking about grief and the pain of that you know I just two people humans that have experienced loss and I'm kind of proud of that cause I think that that's such a reminder that like we are all human and that's what's core and and so maybe we need like grief support groups to heal the world who knows but like um so I think what it's made me feel um I don't know I'm I'm kind of agnostic in in terms of if there's there's an afterlife or not I I who knows but I think I think trying to like live life well and enjoy what you can and that's not always possible um and I think also part of untangle to some extent was me probably doing my own version of the longevity movement which was trying to come to terms with grief and the fact that the people I love and close to me might die um so my way of dealing with death was to be like I'm gonna lean into it so hard and yeah talk about it all the time um so maybe I've got my own kind of processing happening there but um you know it's a completely completely different way but I don't know I think it's just made me see like we're all human we're all different shit happens and you just gotta live your life basically so it's not very profound but that's the truth well there's certainly there's a refreshing honesty and openness to the way you talk about you know a difficult subject and I'm I'm I'm kind of extrapolating that that carries through into into like a directness of the way you engage with life in general that's the feeling I get from talking to you yeah I think that's true um actually I went I actually saw a Holocaust survivor speak on Tuesday evening and someone you know asked this question at the end um about a kind of meaning and you know what why did she think she survived and you know and and like was I think trying to find some kind of profound insight into her like really hard experience and she she was just like I don't know why I'm still here it's just I just got through each day and that's that's you know all I could do and I thought it was kind of kind of amazing to hear that from someone who's you know really seen humanity at their worst to just say yeah I just kind of got through each day and and that's that's it and I I think that is ultimately like we're just little animals on a planet and yeah um and you know you we want I think we we're all I feel like you know I don't know I'm like pursuing some kind of meaning in my life I I don't know but ultimately I'm gonna die you know and and that legacy will disappear and um so I I think trying to yeah live for that I yeah I'm quite an open person I definitely would say that's true um that's probably the the product of it and I like having I like talking to people about things that are difficult and yeah um cause it's it's really interesting in a funny sort of way it seems as though working in a very difficult space has has energized you and and um you know and by talking about things that people normally don't um my reading from this the moment of truth you can say is that uh you know you really have to come to terms with the idea that people do die and maybe in a way that's empowering and um that's a an empowerment that the you know these alternative uh uh uh movements of of of wanting to live forever um uh will will will never see they'll never see that empowerment I think what's quite uh interesting is like um especially actually when I look at health and wellness that's grown so much as a category of you know um like an industry and a lot of that I think is people trying to pursue some kind of like secular enlightenment so through society and that's not a good thing necessarily there's been lots and lots of issues but there was kind of religion and you had your sense of purpose and your you know this is your deity and you understand you understood where you lived you sat in a community and then in like the 20th and 21st centuries we've kind of moved into this like um kind of more kind of capitalist society where you as individuals we now look internally rather than out to community to find purpose and meaning so you know everyone's in therapy um therapy can can be amazing I've done lots of therapy but a lot of that is like if I understand myself better I will live a I will feel good and I will live a meaningful life um and I think that in a way like the wellness movement is a is a build on that which is like if I'm just you know running marathons and doing all these things all the time and really looking after myself I will be happy and I will live a good life and and I think the that actually maybe we've we're struggling as a society like kind of western modern secular society to find a way of getting meaning and purpose um and a sense of belonging cause I do think community is really important um and somehow uh and I and I think there is a bit of a movement towards like you know social run clubs as an example of people like they're running but actually they're connecting with people on a Sunday you know where people might have gone to church or something else um I'm you know I'm not necessarily advocating for religion but a sense of belonging and a sense of purpose that's something I've observed through dealing with people that have and supporting people and and you know observing when we go through a death a lot of people have like a bit of an identity crisis and you know you think like what's the point and off the back of that start to explore like who are my people and also like what's the point of my life and and I think like as humans we're all kind of doing that and I think we're struggling a little bit at the moment and that's like you know everyone talks about this loneliness epidemic and um you know you see like political extremity emerging and that is people trying to find belonging and purpose I think um so I don't know what the answer is but I think looking at at death and people going through grief kind of makes you look back step back and look at society as a whole and like fundamentally what are humans wired for and what do we need and I think that's my insight of what comes out I don't know what the answer is but there's I think there's a bit of a void at the moment and we're not sure how to fill it belonging connection sense of uh being part of something beyond sort of the uh the the individual consumer hmm who's being kind of given given material things I'm being told by society to pursue that at every opportunity there's clearly something in people trying to find something to connect with and and because of what you do you're right at the at the face of it and um you mentioned in the in the in your communities where you have you know maybe people with very different views on life but under the surface they've got very very similar views on life hmm um you can look at someone who's quite extreme as a person maybe um or and look at it through that lens and then you kind of can have more empathy for them cause you're like while you're just kind of doing that human thing of trying to find connection and what a lovely place to come to when we're talking about heartwarming when we started off by talking about grief and kind of come full circle through that um which brings me to my last question Emily and I've really enjoyed this conversation with you um if somebody is listening to this podcast say in five years time they go back and find a five year old podcast and listen to it what would be what would be the one message you would want them to take away from it of course I don't know make a will and so just have a nice day seems like a great answer to me thanks very much for coming on the podcast so much thank you