Host a Final Fling

Host a Final Fling

Host a Final Fling

If you’re planning to organise an event this year to encourage openness around death and dying, why not host a Final Fling. Be part of the movement!

Get our How-to guide for top tips.

In our world, ‘Final Fling’ means 3 things:

  • it’s www.finalfling.com – our growing online community that provides a source of information and set of planning tools to support making life and death decisions.
  • it’s the spirited name we give to a funeral or end-of-life celebration.
  • it’s an event or activity that promotes openness around end-of-life.

Out there in the world, others use the term “Final Fling” in different contexts.  It’s the ball or gathering celebrating the end of university years. It’s the last wild night out before settling down to a committed partnership (… if you have the emotional maturity of a 14 year old). It’s the never-ending goodbye Status Quo tour. When our Founder, B, took the idea for Final Fling to BBC’s Dragons Den, Duncan Bannatyne thought Final Fling was to be a date site for older people. Wishful thinking Dunc.

WHO might host a Final Fling?

Any individual, group of friends, family, community of people or organisation. For example, at the start of 2015, friend of Final Fling, Allistair Anderson at Compassionate Funerals held a festival called Bold Words that featured 3 key constructs:

WHY host a Final Fling?

The context can vary – from a funeral to remembrance tribute or an event to encourage others to think and talk openly about life and death.

Here’s our Top 5 reasons to host a Final Fling:

  1. as a life celebration or memorial event
  2. as a way of facing and embracing mortality
  3. as an event for Dying Matters Awareness Week in May
  4. as an end-of-life planning workshop
  5. as the finale of an event or festival.

HOW to host a Final Fling

First, see our How-to guide. It includes information on activities like Fling-O-Bingo and useful tools for engaging, like our unique fortune teller.

The main thing we advocate is that any Final Fling should be about meaning and value for everyone involved. It’s not about how much cash you splash. The more a Final Fling is hand-knitted, sleeves rolled up, all-hands-to-the-tiller, the better. Spending time together baking squiffy-looking buns is better than spending a lot of money on top-end catering. It’s the process that counts. Being part of organising a Final Fling provides an important connection among people, helping build relationships, ownership of the event and crucially, affords time for casual conversations about important issues. It’s the chat in the background, over the stove, at the sink, doing the shopping that counts.

So, get to it. Download our How-to host a Final Fling guide and start planning!

REMEMBER: add your Final Fling event to our Events calendar – it’s free to use and it’ll help you promote your event. Send us a blog about your event in advance or a report-back on how it went and we’ll share with our community on Final Fling’s regular blog.