High Holy Days
2 days ago • Sep 12, 2026

To Live and Love Well Not in Spite of Death, But Because of It

By
Rabbi Sharon Brous and Dr. BJ Miller

Co-author of the book A Beginner’s Guide to the End, and palliative care specialist BJ Miller helps patients and families face illness and death realistically, comfortably, and on their own terms. Miller is cultivating a model for palliative care organizations around the world, and emphasizing healthcare’s quixotic relationship to the inevitability of death. He is a hospice and palliative medicine physician and sees patients and families via telehealth at Mettle Health, a company he co-founded with the aim to provide personalized, holistic consultations for any patient or caregiver who needs help navigating the many practical, emotional and communication issues that come with serious or chronic illness, end of life and disability. Miller’s passion for palliative care stems from personal experience — a shock sustained while a Princeton undergraduate cost him three limbs and nearly killed him. But his experiences form the foundation of a hard-won empathy for patients who are running out of time.

Let’s Begin at the End: Learning to Live and Love Well Not in Spite of Death, But Because of It. A conversation between Rabbi Sharon Brous and Dr. BJ Miller on Rosh Hashanah II.