In the Harvard Business Review of all places.

Great, thoughtful review of an important HBO special here.  I don't even have access to HBO, so I have to go out of my way to find this, but it's worth it.  Although most people put off planning and thinking about end-of-life decisions too long because they think it's depressing, the reality is that most people find that doing the work and thinking about their wishes for end-of-life care and final arrangements is actually uplifting; there's a lightening that you feel when you make your peace with the fact that we're all mortal, and that we will all leave people we care about and stuff we've acquired behind.  Life planning, including plans for what to do if we find ourselves faced with intractable pain, is actually a liberating thing to do.