How to Pay Tribute to a Deceased Loved One 

22 Dec 2022

Showing your respect and honouring a deceased loved one can be a profound emotional experience. That’s because it goes beyond remembering the person. It’s also about remembering how it felt when your loved one was still around. 

Honouring a deceased loved one 

Fortunately, the feeling doesn’t have to end because your loved one has passed away. You can still keep honouring them and experiencing their memory. In other words, you don’t have to let it all go. You can still keep most of the memories with you and experience them from time to time. There are several ways to do that: 

  • Having a moment of silence 
  • Keeping some of their items close by 
  • Completing their unfinished tasks and projects 
  • Making a donation or supporting their favourite cause 
  • Creating a memorial that somehow shows how they lived and touched your heart 

During a moment of silence, you can utter a short prayer or briefly remember the times you were still with your departed loved one. You can also remind yourself of their legacy and how they have influenced your life. 

Another way to remind yourself of the things they did and shared is by briefly looking at and touching their personal items. You can also go to their room and see, smell and touch their old clothes. This can be an extremely emotional experience. But this also shows you still remember them and you always wish they’re still here with you. 

Aside from remembering them during moments of silence and whenever you look at and touch their personal items, you can also go beyond and complete their unfinished tasks and projects. It’s a way to honour them and perhaps the project will benefit others. 

If your loved one was supporting a cause to benefit others, you can do the same by making a donation or helping expand the reach of the cause or advocacy. Notice that this is another way of somehow completing their unfinished tasks and projects. Surely, your loved one was planning to do more and want to contribute more. You might be up for the task and on their behalf, you can continue their contribution. 

Also, a long-term way to honour them is by building a memorial that somehow shows how they lived and touched your heart. The memorial can have an inscribed short phrase, a Bible verse or their favourite quote. 

Through those ways of honouring them, the memories of our deceased loved ones will always remain. Some of those moments may suddenly flash randomly and make us feel emotional again. Those moments can also make us feel thankful about their lives and think deeply about our own.