Eulogy Exercise Application - RUDIUS STRATEGIES GROUP

The Eulogy Exercise

Write your own eulogy to shape your future

While you could write a chronological eulogy—going through each of your accomplishments and important steps in your life—it’s more powerful to go about it through common themes weaving a thread in the narrative of your life.

This is by no means a comprehensive guide to writing a eulogy in general, but answering these questions may help you draft an outline.

It’s very important that you don’t rush when answering these questions. Take your time to consider your responses. You should answer them in the past, present AND future you.

1. Where did you go to school? Did you ever go back to school? Were you self-taught? What did you study? What kind of student were you?

2. From childhood to retirement, where did you live? Did you stay put or did you explore the world? What kind of places did you enjoy most?

3. What did you do for work? What kind of teammate were you? Did you stay at the same company, or did you work at various places? Did you start a company? If so, how did it go? Did you win any awards for your work?

4. Where were you born? Any interesting anecdotes about your childhood, or aspects of your culture that shaped you?

5. Did you have a small or a large group of friends? Did you ever get married? Did you have kids? What kind of relationship did you have with them? Were you often in touch with your family?

6. Did you have any side projects? Hobbies you enjoyed outside of work? Were these solo hobbies or did you invite friends or family to join you? Any noteworthy accomplishments?

7. What did people admire the most about you? What did they enjoy the most when spending time with you? What were some compliments you often received? What are some times you helped people in a way they will remember? What will people miss the most about you?

8. What are some things that you would like said about you? What adjectives or accomplishments, now or in the future, would you like shared in your eulogy?

Name

After you have completed the exercise, your responses will be sent back to you for use in preparing a single narrative for what you would want said at your memorial service.

Example Eulogy:

{Name} is impossible to sum up — we’d be here all day if I had the opportunity to share with you all all the wonderful things he/she did, taught, and accomplished in his/her life. To spare you all from that I’ve decided to restrict this to a short list of some of the best qualities of {Name}. Without further ado, here’s the things that made {Name} the man/woman he/she was:

{Name} was compassionate and kind, funny yet stoic, bubbly yet reserved, and quietly bonded family together through difficult storms and joyful moments.
{Name} was the BEST on the grill and 5 year winner of the Best Chili award at our annual chili cookoff.
{Name} hated the Patriots, with a passion.
{Name}'d sneak out in the middle of the night when we were younger to take us to midnight premiers of our favorite movies -- much to the dismay of dad/mom.
{Name} once drove over 500 miles to help a friend move out from an apartment -- again, in the middle of the night.
{Name} was known by his/her entire group of friends as "________________".
Family was the most important thing in {Name}’s life.
{Spouse Name} was the love of his/her life and never failed to put a twinkle in his/her eye.
{Name} is the reason I am the person I am today. He/She was endlessly encouraging, loving, caring, and intelligent. To lose him/her is to lose a piece of life itself.