In the Northern hemisphere where I live, and specifically in the Pacific Northwest, the days are becoming shorter, the sun less intense, and the mornings and evenings are crisp in a way they weren’t only a few short weeks ago.
With the coming of Autumn, and the fading of summer warmth and levity, many of us may be feeling the places of latent grief resurfacing.
Some people approach this seasonal shift with a sense of foreboding and dread.
Personally, this season has always felt like a warm blanket that has the ability to hold the full emotional depth of my experience.
I secretly love September.
Most of us aren’t raised in a culture that welcomes feelings or teaches us how to work with them.
And we certainly aren’t taught how to work with bring-you-to-your-knees kind of grief.
Generally, our society sees grief as something to, “get over,” and also, you “should” do it privately.
Many of the popular psychological experts suggest that it will take a certain amount of time, and then you will start to, “feel better.”
If you don’t ‘get over it’, there is a special diagnoses for that – “Persistent Grief Disorder.”
If you want to make me crazy and get me ranting, tell me you believe this.
For your benefit, in this conversation, I’ll take some deep breaths and contain myself.
I get it. We’ve been taught this our whole lives. It’s deeply ingrained.
But let me tell you the truth.
Those of us who have experienced life-shattering loss understand this: grief has no timeline, and it isn’t something that we “get over.”
Grief is an initiation.
It is a thing that happens that changes us forever.
Once we know deep grief, (and some of us are born knowing it!) we can never “unknow” it.
It is a part of the fabric of our being.
Does this mean we always will feel sad, angry or despairing? Absolutely not.
What it often means is that we deepen our connection with Spirit. (Or if we haven’t had a connection with Spirit in our lives previously, we are drawn to build that connection.)
If we have had a lifelong spiritual practice, our connection sometimes deepens dramatically overnight.
If we haven’t had a Spiritual practice, we may now feel drawn to understanding where our beloved might be, if they are no longer with us, and we may seek guidance in Nature and the Spiritual realms.
We will intuitively recognize that our experience isn’t something that is widely understood in the human world, but it’s more than that.
When we are deeply bonded with someone who “crosses over,” a part of us, for a time, goes with them.
We are literally living in between worlds.
We may seek connection and understanding in places we may have previously been afraid of or simply not that interested in.
Suddenly, we are in a relationship with Spirit.
Not only do we become more Spiritual, but we also have a different perspective of life and the human world.
We see how fragile life is.
How precious.
How temporary.
If we can move through the waves of emotions and energy that come with our grief, eventually, we will most likely find ourselves in a place of deep gratitude and reverence for All-That-Is.
Which does NOT mean the grief is gone.
Eventually, we learn to walk with grief as a companion and trusted friend, rather than a thing we wish we could get rid of.
And slowly, we begin to recognize that reverence, gratitude, and even deep joy can be a part of this new Self we have become.
We begin to transform our pain into medicine for the world.
If we get stuck in our grief, however, we may feel more and more disconnected from Spirit, from our own Soul and from everyone around us.
This is why it is so essential to have the right support to move through grief. It’s not that we are fixing it – it’s that we need to work with this powerful energy in a way that makes it into medicine.
This is why I’m so passionate about teaching this work. I know how much we need, as a society, places where people can come together and support each other through these times.
To work with practices to help access the healing power of your grief, and to be a part of a community that understands you don’t need to be fixed, can make all the difference.
Because truly, there is no way but through.
