Don’t let anyone rush, reframe or minimize your grief. If they try to, they’re telling you their discomfort is more important than your reality. And it only reveals how insecure and unsure they really are at their core.
Navigating loss of any kind needs grief in order to healthily process our emotions and regulate our nervous system back to its current set point. And that loss can come in many forms.
Loss can be tangible or abstract. Loss of an ideal can be equally upsetting as loss of physical loved one in our life. Loss is a reality shakedown of sorts. A shock to our system. Someone, something, or a value we believed was shared, isn’t.
And something we thought wouldn’t happen, does.
And that loss requires mourning, grief or the processing of ‘sadness’.
And anyone who rushes you through it, or tells you to “get over it already!” is revealing their own discomfort and emotional underdevelopment. We can have compassion for them. And then walk away. You have a right to grieve.
It means that you care deeply about something.
Grief can also be mysterious and tricky.
There’s no one way to experience grief.
Some people wail, cry or weep. Tears are one of ways our bodies regulate and recenter itself. Some people, shout, scream or journal to offload and process their grief into words. And still others use strenuous work or intense exercise to express grief out of their bodies.
Is one way more helpful than another? I can’t answer that for you. But my sense is as long as you allow the feeling to process while you’re doing it, recognize that you are processing grief and don’t create collateral damage in your relationships or to your health with your choice of expression…well, in my eyes, it’s all grief work. And it’s all a form somatic processing.
HELPFUL GRIEF PROCESSING -> the allowance of the emotion with awareness around your expression and without collateral damage to yourself or others. At least that how I see it.
And the deeper our commitment to what was lost, and the deeper our love or belief was….. the greater the shock, disappointment and grief will be.
Healthy grieving ( if we don’t cling to it or avoid it ) is a proportionate response.
If we find ourselves grieving disproportionately to what was lost? We may be grieving compounding losses. That happens sometimes, one thing uncorks another. If you find yourself there, don’t go it alone. Compounding grief is not something we’re meant to carry solo. Reach out for support. You’ll find others are going through something similar.
The Middle ground of Grief
That being said, we also don’t benefit from fanning the flames of grief by mentally re-circling the loss. As we’re trying to make sense of our loss, we may get some answers. And we may never get others. I’ve found there’s a point where searching to make sense of something can become more exhaustive than beneficial. Staying aware of this fine line helps me optimize my energy and direct it towards things that bring out the best in me.
In other words, I’ve discovered that somewhere between bypassing grief entirely, and unhelpfully prolonging it, is a normal cycle that is individual to everyone.
So allow your emotions to process. Don’t hold back. Yet also don’t go down mental rabbit holes that prolong it beyond its natural, helpful cycle.
How can we tell?
At this point, you may be wondering, "so how can I tell if I’ve in that ‘middle zone’ of natural, appropriate grief?” Well for me, I can tell I’m in that middle zone of natural, appropriate grief because I’m still moving. It may be slow some days, very slow. but I’m moving. If I find myself shutting down completely in a dark hole of despair, or I find myself scurrying around and feeling nothing…that tells me I’m outside my range of a healthy grief processing.
I call it ‘Active Grief’ - emotional processing and reset without me clinging to it and without me avoiding it. And it can be a bumpy ride until it’s over. But I can handle bumpy. And so can you. We don’t have to like it, but we can do 'bumpy'.
So on that note, when is the grief processing 'ride' over for each person? How can we tell when it's over?
Well, everyone has different 'tells'. But what I’ve noticed in myself is that it’s a blend of two things happening at once: the emotional cycle naturally running its course in my body, while simultaneously I start to see an answer to the question ‘what’s next?’.
After the Grief
Sometimes I feel powerless when I’m grieving – that feeling that we want to do more but feel limited, like there’s a gap, or distance between what we want to do and what we can do. And when grief is coming to the end of its natural, non-restrained, yet non-amplified cycle I notice that gap closing.
I notice that I start to move more steadily forward, more consistently. I notice I feel lighter more often, heavier less often and I start to see where I can fit into the next chapter, how I can respond, gain autonomy, serve and contribute using my skills, education and experience within the sphere of influence that I have.
Said differently, I start to see more clearly what I can do and how to live the next chapter of my life. And quite honestly, today as I'm writing this post, I’m not there yet.
But I see it vaguely on the horizon.
I see a fuzzy image of the role I can play, where I can serve and how I can do so WITHOUT SACRIFICING MY INTEGRITY, HUMANITY OR DIGNITY.
It will still involve my quest to get as many people as possible experiencing the emotional stability that I believe is the foundation for a comprehensive, meaningful and relational human life. But a change in times require a change in response.
And as soon as I’m clear on what that looks like, I’ll let you know and invite you to join me. Believe me, we need as many hands on deck for the future that is unfolding before us.
But in the meantime, don’t let anyone rush your grief process.
Allow it to run its course without blocking it OR adding fuel to its fire…
And somewhere along the way, ask yourself these questions:
What is my sphere of influence?
Where can I add value and support my beliefs using my expertise, experience or education?
Where can I make a unique contribution towards what I want to see more of?
Who do I want to be?
Big or small, all answers that come from the heart as well as your head, move the needle on the preservation of our humanity.
Jen
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