Americans have long been chided as the only people on earth who believe death is optional. But the quip is losing its premise. A recent profusion of personal narratives, best-selling books and social entrepreneurs’ projects…

Two organizations are unifying in an effort to change the way Americans approach advance care planning. In a survey conducted by The Conversation Project in 2012, 90 percent of respondents said they believe it is important to discuss their end-of-life care wishes. Yet, that same survey also found that only 30 percent of those individuals are actually having the conversations.

In the end, the personal was political. What brought the 78-year-old California governor and former Jesuit seminarian to sign the law that will allow doctors to prescribe life-ending drugs to terminally ill patients was thinking…