In South Korea, a trend is emerging for residents of the country to rehearse their own funerals. This practice is reported by The New York Times.
A service is provided, for example, by the Seoul Hyowon Healing Center, which is financially supported by a funeral services company. The program is free, and since 2012, about 15 thousand people have used it in Hyowon Healing alone.
Some of them had incurable diseases and thus wanted to prepare for death, others felt suicidal urges and tried to dispel them, and still others became participants in motivational programs at work.
As part of the program, participants listen to a lecture and watch an instructional video in a hall decorated with traditional chrysanthemums. After that, they write a will and put them in coffins.
A black-clad employee of the center, posing as a "messenger from another world," is closing the lids. In complete darkness in a boarded-up coffin, the event participants spend 10 minutes.
Promotional video:
Many of those who went through extraordinary experiences stated that they felt renewed. One of the participants, who stated before the program that she had thoughts of suicide, after 10 minutes in a coffin wrote in a blog that she felt her heart beating and felt alive.