The Four Things That Matter Most - 10th Anniversary Edition: A Book About Living Hardcover – June 10, 2014

This book has made a true difference in my life. Through the reading of the book, l realized that there were people in my life that needed to hear the four things that matter most, l called them up, and told them so. You will never know the difference that simple action made in our relationships. Eve thou the author speaks about people in hospice and palliative care, those four things are essential to express to the people important to us at any time in life. I am profoundly grateful for having bought and read this book. I bought another copy as a Christmas gift for my best friend. I highly recommend it.

I have meant to read this title for several years now. This is a remarkable read with Wisdom for those facing a terminal illness and the people that care for them. As someone currently struggling with a terminal disease, I really appreciate both the spiritual and practical sides of living life's final chapter that the author provides. Like the author, I don't know if I have the discipline to always practice the 'four things', but now I'm inspired to try.

This was one of the early books I started reading on my journey to find out how to live life a better way. I only knew what I had seen growing up and I wanted something better, something happier and more loving but I didn't know how to get there on my own.This book is so basic yet so powerful at the same time. Sometimes it really is the little things that end up being the biggest things.This books helped give me perspective and fueled me to continue on my happiness journey. I have ready many more books since this one but it's so interesting to look back and know how everything started. I highly recommend you read this book, sometime when you are not distracted and can give it your full attention. You'll be glad you did.

This book lays out a very helpful set of steps to take and things to say when you or someone you love is close to death or going through a difficult period in life. It gives a sense of healing to human relationships.

"Please forgive me", "I forgive you", "Thank you", "I love you"—the four things that matter, especially before we say “goodbye” at the end of life. As a palliative care expert, Dr. Byock has seen the healing power of these words many times. “The specter of death reveals our relationships to be our most precious possessions,” he states. Through a variety case studies, Byock shows his readers just how powerful those twelve words can be, if we say them. “Life presents us with a choice: we can choose to protect ourselves from emotional pain—or we can acknowledge our vulnerability and open ourselves to the loss that love will ultimately entail.” This choice is key to the blessing we say at parting in church: “God be with you.”

I wish to thank Ira Byock for writing this book and sharing with us his experience, his humanity. Dr Byock's writing shows a humility that I admire. Reading this book constitutes for me an important step on my journey. By practicing the Four Things, by earnestly and honestly asking for forgiveness, by truly forgiving without seeking reward, by expressing gratefulness and loving as unconditionally as my human limitations allow me to, I hope 'to become the change I want to see in the world'. At this stage of my life (loss of my mother, rapidly ageing father, mother-in-law diagnosed with terminal illness, recently blessed with two grand-children), this book fills me with hope, joy, acceptance and love of life. This imminently spiritual book is helping me in letting obstacles such as resentment, anger, fear, shame, guilt, remorse, and all their relatives too numerous to list here fall away, leaving in their stead a vast openness for profound gratefulness and serenity. I think this is what some of us would call happiness.Thank you Dr Byock.For the readers who are actively on a path to spirituality and are touched by Dr Byock's writing, I would strongly recommend the recent book "Dying to be me - my journey from cancer to near death to true healing" by Anita Moorjani.

This book is well written and very comforting. It is enlightening. I have his book "Dying Well" too. I read that years ago and am reading that book again too. He gives examples of the end stage of life and how to approach it well, and how to be supportive of someone in their last weeks and days.His stories are quite moving. His writing has helped me in the past and is helping me right now. I cannot express how much I appreciate these books. They help round out life in beautiful ways.In explaining the four things that mean the most, he is helping families come together in the hardest of times and helping people face things that our society hides and ignores. There can be beauty in a person's last days.I highly recommend this book "The Four Things that Matter Most" and "Dying Well" by the same author.

A really nice book that is helpful for virtually anyone, even though it is dealing primarily with people who are facing death - their own, or that of a loved one. It boils things down nicely. I bought it for my Dad who is in Hospice, but he is old school, and had no interest in it. Recently I discovered that an estranged friend has end stage cancer. I wanted to write a letter, but kept stalling out. My sister had just returned this book after borrowing it, and when I browsed Chapter One again, it inspired me with the format for my letter. Writing that letter using this book helped me with closure, but also, I was surprised at how it helped me to process a lot of feelings I had buried. This book helped me understand all my feelings about my friend, and to find a peaceful place to settle in with what our relationship was and wasn't, and to be okay with all of it.

Great

A beautiful book.

I chose the book because I have aging parents who like ALL OF US have made some mistakes in their lifetime. It was well written and had some good stories. But it did feel as though it was directed at the immediately dying individual instead of a book that focuses on living well while you are live before you get a death sentence. But overall... it was ok.