Adam Torres and Dr. Kimberly Harms discuss Kimberly’s book.
Subscribe: iTunes / Spotify
Apply to be a guest on our podcast here
Show Notes:
New book alert! In this episode, Adam Torres interviews Dr. Kimberly Harms, Founder of Last Minute Legacy, explore Kimberly’s book, Are You Ready?: How to Build a Legacy to Die For.
About Dr. Kimberly Harms
Dental Association, President Minnesota Dental Association (2000), Chair American Dental Association’s Council on Communications (2004) , Representative American Dental Association’s Council on Governmental Affairs,Farmington School Board (1986-1999, Chair 1996-1999), President Delegation for Friendship Among Women (advocates for the advancement of women in developing countries), Vice Chair Union Gospel Mission Board, Container Captain Books for Africa, Eric Harms Memorial Library
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest on the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, today’s guest is Dr. Kimberly Harms, and she is founder of Last Minute Legacy and also author of Are You Ready?
How to Build a Legacy to Die For. Kimberly, welcome to the show. Thank you so much, Adam. It’s a pleasure to be here. Thank you. All right. So we got a lot to talk about. So the book, of course, Are You Ready? How to Build a Legacy to Die For. I, of course, want to get into that as well. But before we do, I mean, how did you get on this path to even writing this book?
Like, tell us a little bit more about, about your career. Well, that’s a good question. I, most of my career I’ve spent in dentistry. In fact, I was a national spokesperson for the American Dental Association. I was the first one president of the Minnesota Dental Association. And that’s where I thought my path would be.
So I kept going and then all of a sudden I had an injury in my nerve damage in my drilling fingers and one day was told by the doctors at Mayo Clinic that I was done practicing dentistry, which was a big blow. Yeah. And so I found that, I find, was this 54 before retirement age or before any of that stuff like Yeah,
I was 54. Oh, wow. You young. It was in my prime. In my prime. Dang it. Yeah. You were young. Mm-Hmm. . I know. And it was unexpected. And so I found my life. I’ve also suffered the loss from suicide of my mother and my son. . . And then just four years ago I lost my husband, who was also my partner in dentistry.
So I’ve had a lot of. Times in my life where I had to re frame myself, re identify myself, figure out what is my purpose in life. I’m a, I’m a person of faith. So that luckily, you know, have them that spiritual side as well. What is my purpose? What am I here for? And it’s a question we all ask. What’s our mission, right?
Yeah. So I first, I wrote actually a couple of books helping widows, devotionals for widows, because that widowhood is such a difficult time. And I worked with people who had lost children. But then I thought, where am I? Here I am. My husband passed away, and I’m no longer taking care of him. What am I doing now?
And I’m between menopause on one side and death on the other. So those are like the two corners. And I thought, well, what the heck do I do now? Right. And I feel that at this time, is that a book title between menopause and death? I don’t know. I mean, you got a lot of books. There’s another book right there.
It’s a strange place. Let me tell you. And so I really just kind of started thinking and I was, you know, Helping these widows and the widows were struggling just as I was with all these questions. What do we do now? And then I realized that there really is no plan. There’s no, you know, there’s no there’s nothing that kind of shows us What do we do?
How do we find purpose? There are some things out there, but not many and so I just started writing a book and I wrote a book I started the first part of the book is on what our legacy is and I met when I talk about legacy Of course money is part of a legacy, but that is not what I write about I write about the legacies of love and kindness And you know, hard work, faith, all these things that we can leave to our children.
I’ve got two surviving children. I have six amazing grandchildren. So they’re, that’s what I focus on are those little pumpkins. I just want to make sure I do whatever I can as a grandma to be a good grandma. And and so I, the first part focuses on legacies of amazing people. And if you look back in your life, all of us have met some amazing people who have amazing legacies.
And I worked in Rwanda and I have a Holocaust survivor in the book. So some amazing. People that have survived insurmountable odds that have come back. I think resilience. I lost my son to suicide right after the breakup with a girlfriend. So resilience is a big topic for me. I want to bring resilience to my children and my grandchildren and the 2nd part of the book.
I became a death duel at the time, because I wanted to really learn more about this process. So the 2nd part is just facing death and dying what people think different beliefs have different. Thoughts on what happens after you die. It’s a fascinating topic, by the way. We don’t like to talk about it, but it really is pretty fascinating.
And then the second part of the last part of the book is a workbook and it goes through all the things we need to do to prepare our children for life without us. Now, the 1st part of it has to be the will and the estate plan, which, of course, you need to do with professionals and then all the getting your passwords, all the things you need.
So that when we die, they’re not. Going to come in and have to search through all of our stuff to, you know, to find everything or not find everything, put it all in one place, everything they need so they can process your estate afterwards. Most importantly, leaving love letters for them in the binders you know, the most famous love letter of all time was written by St.
Valentine to be delivered after he died and look at that impact. So give them a Valentine. I put Valentine’s are in my legacy binder. And my hope is that people start doing this their children will have a softer landing. And I know now, I have everything together, that if something were to happen to me, my kids would be fine.
Everything is right there. They know where it is. They’ll have an easy time planning my state. And most importantly, I’ve done everything to ensure that their relationship with each other, Is strong because 57 percent of people report conflict around the death of a loved one because things aren’t planned right.
And I want to make sure that doesn’t happen to my family. I, tell you that, this type of book is so, needed and it’s just one of those things. That I can tell you, I’m going through that right now. So I recently lost my mother and I’m literally dealing with all of those different things.
And as I, and as I’m going through them, she did have a lot of things in order. And when you talk about letters, yeah, we found the letters and we found some other, I don’t, I don’t know if she read your book. But she got bits and pieces of them from the other areas. So I, I get it. I get it. As you’re talking about these things, I’m thinking about the different things that we found and otherwise, as we go through that right now I’m curious on your end, what causes you to like, to wanna help people in the way that you’re doing?
Like there’s this, there’s this threat or there’s this. theme throughout, like ever since, and it probably was even before , you know, you were no longer able to practice dentistry, but, but , after, you know, that piece, at least from what I know, like, and hearing the story, like, there’s this theme of wanting to help widows, help other people, help now with legacy, like, what causes you to do that?
Well, we talk about mission and I’m a person of faith and in my faith, I believe that I was helped. I can’t even tell you the loss of a child by suicide 45 minutes after breakup with a girlfriend. I can’t even tell you what that does to your life. And I’ve been through it. I’ve been at the bottom of that pit.
I’ve, you know, was buying curtains and lived down there forever, you know, at some point. And I realized I had an amazing thing happen to me. Somebody came up to me a couple months after my son died. And He was shaking his finger in my face angrily telling me, don’t you ever let your remaining children feel they are not enough.
Don’t you do that to them. And he was a cousin of my husband’s and that he had lost his brother at about the same age as we lost our son and he felt he lost his parents at the same time. And, and I was on that road. I could see I could have stayed in that pit forever and just, you know, cried my way through life.
And I didn’t, I fought my way out because it was not just me anymore. It was my husband who had just had a liver transplant right before my son died, my husband, my 2 daughters I just fought, fought, fought, and I think that I, in doing so, I was, I had like, what I call them, little angels, lots of people around me that just kind of helped, helped me when I needed it, helped me through, and I really do believe that our job on earth is just, you know, our purpose, our mission in life, just general, you know, You know, life is to help each other along, to help us get through, because it’s really tough.
There’s some big things that happen. And I had people help me. I had my God help me. And so my job, and I believe it’s a mandate for me, is that I, my job is to help other people get through these things, too, and to let them know that there can be joy at the end. You don’t think about it. Again, in my faith, you know, the joy of the Lord is our strength.
So I feel that that we can, you know, Help people understand that you can be joyful in the midst of sorrow. And, I, can I tell just a quick little story about my granddaughter? Of course, please. Because I, because I talked, I talked to my kids, I talked to my grandkids, because I’m trying to make them resilient, right?
I’m trying to help them realize that I’m going to go at some time. Grandma’s going to die and you’re going to be They’re probably like, why is grandma always talking about that? They don’t know yet, right? They don’t know yet, but they’ll be ready. They’ll be resilient. And I know that. This is my little Heidi, little redheaded Heidi was sitting at the table and I was, and she said, Nana.
And I said, yeah, Heidi. She goes, is what happened to pop up happens to you? And I said, well, what do you mean Heidi? She goes, well, do you mean if you die, if I die? Yeah, Nana, if you die. And I said, go ahead, Heidi, tell me, what are you trying to say? She goes, well, Nana, if you die, can we still go to Disney world?
And I said, yes. Okay. Yes, I want you to go to Disney World, I want you to thrive, I want you to flourish, I want you to have happiness in your life, and every time you And after I read your book, Kimberly, she’s going to be like and Nana, could you write that down in the well? Well, no, actually, could you write down my trip just in case?
I want to make sure it doesn’t get lost. Just interestingly enough, I am writing it in the book by telling my daughters are my attorneys, too. I’m telling them not to tell the kids, because I don’t want them to look forward to my death, you know, what would happen, , but I am putting it in the script.
Okay, so there’s a line to draw. There’s a line. I’m not gonna let them know, because, you know, I don’t want them to think, okay, when’s she gonna go? I want to go to Disney World. But I sent that down, and I also wrote down in my will, I put money aside for the trip, and money aside, To get rid of all my stuff, because you know how hard it is when you die to have your kids, and usually it’s just one kid, and that tends to cause stress.
I have companies, there are companies out there that will just, you know, I said, kids go through all my stuff, take whatever you want, and use company, here’s money, they’re going to come and get rid of it all. So I’m trying to make things as easy as possible when I go, but yes, that trip is going to be planned, but my grandkids aren’t going to know about it.
Oh, so , your book cover, I’m looking at it and I see this picture frame and I see these four women and they’re holding up some things. What am I looking at? It looks amazing. You are looking at my book club. I have been blessed with amazing friends, lifetime friends, and those are four of my friends in the book club and, There I use I started out on them.
They were my guinea pigs and I started on them, helping them get their stuff together and they’re holding up their folders saying, yes, I’m ready. I can. I’m ready to go. So there and it was happened to be my friend, Laura, Martha, who’s in the front it was her 70th birthday. So we kind of celebrated her 70th birthday by by getting ready.
So that was really fun for us. Oh my gosh, that’s amazing. Go, go, go figure. I was looking at it and I’m like, there’s gotta be a story behind that because that is a very unique book cover and it looks really cool. I was thinking they might be holding up and I noticed they’re all different colors, like their folders and stuff.
It almost looks like an arts and crafts project. I don’t know. Well, you know, , I was big into scrapbooking, you know, so we have to, you know, we have to make it nice for our friends. Right? Yes, of course. So, when we think about this concept of legacy, like, what does that mean to you? And how’s that addressed in the book?
Like, what does legacy mean? Your legacy is every interaction you have with every person in your life. And that’s one of the reasons it’s so great to get out of that grief pit, because when you’re in the grief pit, when you’re suffering, you know, your legacy might be kind of spreading sadness a little bit, you know.
Whereas when you can get out of there and have joy in your life joy is contagious in your legacy. . . My, I hope that my legacy is love and joy. That’s the most important legacy. But it’s every interaction you have with every person that you have. Mm-Hmm. . And if you live with your legacy in mind, you keep that in mind because sometimes I had a experience a couple.
Weeks ago where I was in Chipotle and this, you know, the customer from hell was right in front of me and it was taking her 15 minutes and she kept changing her mind. This poor 17 year old was behind her, you know, trying to help. And, and, and I was starting to get a little, you know, frustrated because I had to get somewhere, you know, it was getting like, come on, come on, come on.
And this little young man just looked up at me with these, you know, like, Kind of big deer in headlight eyes, you know, trying to help this woman. And I just gave him a big thumbs up, like, go, you’re doing fine. And you could just see his whole body just relax because he was stressed and I could help him not be stressed.
Now that just came to me. There were times that my reaction would be like, come on, look at my watch. Like, come on here. I didn’t, I realized he needed someone to give him some, some a thumbs up. And what happens when you live like that? So he was helped, but then I was helped because you get a big, There’s an endorphin rush when you do things like that.
When you spread joy to other people, you get it right back. It’s like a win win situation. It’s amazing how that works. So I think little things like that, how you, how you address people in the line, how you treat your servers, , how you treat everybody in your life. And you know, I’m not always perfect. I mess up too, you know, as everyone does, but, but I think living with that in mind, this is my legacy.
This is what I’m leaving. I’m leaving this behind. What do I want To how do I want people to feel after I leave them? And that’s important. You’re also known for and I’ve never really heard this concept until until working with you as an emotional life insurance plan for your family. What does that mean?
And how do you develop? Well, so we’re used to getting that financial life insurance plan. Right? And I’m trying to encourage people to think about this when they’re younger, because, you know, I know I’m in the fourth quarter of my life because I can do the math. But. People that are younger don’t know things.
Death comes unexpectedly. I lost a 54 year old niece just recently. So so I think that when we’re doing that financial life insurance, think about the emotional life insurance and the emotional life insurance plan to me is making sure you have everything put together in a way that helps your family emotionally, because sometimes people put their wills together in a way that that causes division.
And they’re not really thinking about the emotional consequences of what they’re doing. And so I want them, as they’re getting their estate put together, as they’re getting their legacy book put together, think about the emotional impact that has on their children and grandchildren and what they need to feel is love.
They need to feel love. They need to feel you’re proud of them. They need to feel those emotions. Rather than the distrust where the, the anger because, you know, somebody got more than somebody else and there’s no explanation. You can, you don’t have to have everything exactly the same. But I think with a letter of intent, that’s another part of it.
Letter of intent will tell you, you know, I gave Mary Lou additional money because she took care of me for 5 years. And and then there’s an explanation from you that she did that. So that the people that are involved in. You know in. As your heirs are not going to get angry at the person, you know, because they don’t understand why things were done.
So when you’re putting your will together, take a look at the emotional impact it has on the rest of the family. For me, my both my daughters are attorneys. So, when my husband and I, when his was the way we did our will, and we sent it to both of them said, okay, take a look at it. If there’s a problem speak now or forever hold your peace because we want you to get along when you’re done, you know, and you know, I think those are important things.
Oh, my gosh, what a, what a conversation, right? Like, speak now, speak now, and you’re like, all right, well, and one daughter will speak, will talk about death, the other one is, is Mom, I just don’t want to think about when you die, but, but I have to let her know, so I just kind of, I write things down for that one.
I talk to the other one, write things down for the other one. Oh, I think that’s a really interesting point you make actually is to kind of meet your, you know, meet your children or your heirs or meet them where they’re at in terms of their comfortability with the conversation. Right? Like, that’s a great tip you just provided, which is, you know, some may not want to talk about it.
So, right. Like, there’s different ways to communicate. Right? Right. Exactly. And everyone’s different and everyone has a different comfort level. But it’s important. It’s important, even though they don’t realize it. It’s important for them to know in case there’s some surprises like your mom. I mean, I could just feel your mom’s love for you.
And that’s that’s how I feel. That’s your mom was thinking. I’m going to die when I’m going to do work. Now. I’m going to work now. To help my children. I mean, you talk about surprises, the tornadoes in Florida got her. I mean, couldn’t, couldn’t imagine that. Oh, no. She was only 70. She was only 70. Oh, no. You can’t really like, I mean, she was what, six people were taken total.
And two of them were. her and her boyfriend. So like, that’s and I know we’ve been, and I’m like, can’t plan for that one. So when you talk about things can just happen out of nowhere, like that, we were not expecting that, but luckily she did have some of these other things planned like you’re talking about.
And that’s why I like the importance of your work and what you’re doing to, you know, get others out there. there to, , you know, work through these things and have these conversations. It’s important. And I remember, and my mom was always, I think she always had a different view on death in general.
We’re, we’re definitely spiritual people and I was raised Catholic and all that good stuff. So we always had that. Those conversations and she’d make jokes and other things like that. And that was just part of the way our family communicated. And so that, that was always a piece of our family in general.
And I, and, but, and we have, you know, a big family, so that was always a piece of it, but for those that don’t are, are not having the conversation, like I can’t even imagine, wow, you know, and most don’t. Most don’t, most are uncomfortable with it. And that’s where I would like to kind of start a movement to change that, you know, kind of just let’s talk about this.
I love it. I’m in, I think the talk and I think you writing this book and you getting this out there is all super important and I’m happy to bring it to our audience. So thank you, Kimberly. Thank you. So if somebody’s listening to this or watching this, and if they do want to follow up, grab the book, connect with you and your team how do they do that?
Like, what’s the best way? What are the next steps? Well, the book is called Are You Ready? How to Build a Legacy to Die For, and you’d have to type the whole thing in on the search engine. It’s available at Amazon, Barnes Noble, all of those places. You can also check out my website, which is Dr. Kimberly Harms.
And that’ll have some more information. I’m developing a course right now to to help with the book in case people just need a little more motivation because the biggest I think most people realize they need to do this, but we procrastinate because we think we have time. And of course, as you know, death comes unexpectedly.
We can’t. We guarantee to have time. So we need to just do it now. The time to get ready is now because the clock is ticking. So I would just like to encourage people just to get it done now, just like your mom did. I mean, I just, I just want to, I’m so sorry for your loss and I’m, but I’m so proud of your mom that she thought about this beforehand.
Yeah, I agree. I agree the same. So thank you, Kimberly, for coming on the show and for all the work that you do and to the audience. Just so you know, we’re going to put the hyperlink to the book in the show notes. So you can just click on the link and pick up a copy and speaking to the audience. If this is your first time with Mission Matters, and you haven’t done it yet, Be sure to hit that subscribe or follow button.
This is a daily show each and every day. We’re bringing you new content, new ideas, and hopefully new inspiration and tools to help you along the way on your journey as well. So, again, hit that subscribe or follow button and Kimberly again, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you. It’s been a pleasure.