I share with you this week one of grief therapist Sandi Howlett’s assessment of the lessons to be learned after the death of a loved one so that joy can return to your heart and your life.
What you have learned from the death:
* Who you can count on
* The security of a hug
* The value of time
* The comfort of faith
* The power of a handwritten memory or note
* The value of ceremony and ritual
* The wisdom to let others help
* The suspension of time
* The beauty of simplicity
* The power of love
From Sandi: “It has been said that grief does not change us but rather it reveals us. Grief has a way of pulling back our layers of bravado and pretense, exposing who we are at our center…and who we are is usually more than we realized. These revelations have the capacity to change how we go forward. The most compassionate people I have ever met are people who have experienced profound loss. They ‘get’ that life and circumstances are temporary and as such, have a reverence, compassion and appreciation that often eludes others.”
Philosopher Rumi connects sorrow and joy and says it beautifully in this quote: “Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place.
In this forthcoming new year, I hope you can reflect on where you are now in your grief journey and what is next?
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