In Buddhism when a person dies, people turn their back during the funeral to the person. The belief is that on its way to a higher plane, the soul sees as horrors its mistakes or things that tie it back to their previous life and panics. While it tries to escape these horrors or chains, it jumps to the same plane or on a lower one.
I take that a second aspect if the ritual is to let go for ones sake, if I hold to the person I am also holding to my sadness, anger and lack of comprehension to what happened a see through my eyes. I am actually forging the horrors and chains that will tie me up. The consequence is also that then we lose sight of our life and the life around us. So for our own well being, you need to do it.
It is the living creating the chains inside their mind. We are the one who decide to hold to a memory or emotion and try to keep it in an idealized past, a still picture in the chaos of a world of individuals and changing tides.
You can honor the memory of the person but without any sort of judgment, which translates into memories of the actions of the person and its consequences, not the interpretation of the will and judgement; that allows to keep on living, moving forward. So in the end the goal is to thin our chains and although I do not know if Buddhists are correct, I hope to see you all in the next plane, to have a good chat and laugh.
