“Why would you even want to get over grief?”

I have been asked this question a lot. I remember the first time anyone asked me. I was on a course a few years back and I had recently just stepped from general coaching into focusing on where my heart lay – working exclusively with death. I was discussing my work with the group I was sitting in and a women there, whose mother had died, looked at me like there was something a little wrong with me and asked “why would you want to get over it?”.

I was stumped and it was only thinking about it later that I could understand what had happened. What she was really asking was “why would I want to get over my mum?”. And that is a very good question – why on earth would anybody want to do that?!

And that right there is one of the reasons many people hang on to their grief, clinging to it for dear life in some cases. This belief that to get over the pain would be to get over the person. If you believe the grief and the person are one and the same then of course you won’t want to let go of the pain, ever.

Here’s the thing – your pain over the death of someone you love is not them. It isn’t a part of them. It isn’t a memory of them. It isn’t your love for them. It isn’t a link to them. It is only your emotion. Your emotional reaction to their death.

The pain in your broken arm is not your arm. Your toothache is not the same as your tooth.

To get over this pain is not to get over them. To heal from this pain is not to heal from them. To no longer have this pain is not to no longer have them.

It actually works the other way around. The more pain (your emotion) that you are in, the harder it is to think about them, to remember them, to love them…and the less of it you will generally do over time. This is where the idea that ‘time heals’ comes from. Time doesn’t heal – it just buries…and it only buries thoughts, feelings and memories because there is a need i.e. they are painful. For most they do not feel better about a death after a period of time…they simply think about it (and the person who died) less and less. Like with the toothache or the broken arm…if you leave that pain where it is you will stop chewing on that tooth, you will stop using that arm….and after a while it won’t seem to hurt as much, not because the pain isn’t there but because you are avoiding the thing that causes the pain.

When you realise that your pain is not them or a link to them…in fact it is the very thing keeping you cut off and disconnected from them…you can loosen your hold on it and start to let it shift.

Let your pain go….so that you can keep them.

Kristie

xx

sonya mcknight April 16, 2014 at 12:22 pm: Hi Kristie thanks for this the way you have described this is the emotions I am feeling inside my head and inside my heart to since I have lost my mum but what I want to do eventually is to separate the 2 and I do not know how to do that and I cannot do it on my own. How can I do it.

Sonya McKnight.
Leo April 16, 2014 at 4:41 pm: Hey Kristie – well said, as always.

I’ve found that giving my attention to the love I feel for those who have died, and choosing to do absolutely nothing with the painful thoughts and emotions that arise, is sufficient.

Through years of challenging myself to go beyond my apparent limitations, and an intense involvement in many complex therapeutic and spiritual practices, I now find that simply sitting in silence, being still, and resting here and now is the most powerful transformative practice there is.

Namaste!

Leo
Helen April 16, 2014 at 10:03 pm: Hi Kristie

Thank you for this post. It is the first time I have read or heard of anyone addressing the issue of grief in the way you have, so thank you.
Also, thank you for the free download of The 5 Misguided Things etc.
Tara April 17, 2014 at 4:41 am: Dear Kristie,
How I wish my Poppi was still here so that I could share this with him. He died 3 weeks ago after enduring such heart break and despair. He had a terrible time since my Nana passed. They had been married for almost 60 years and Poppi had been in love with her since he was 10 years old. He would always tell me, “I will never stop grieving over her..I will never feel normal again..This pain will never go away.” Things of that nature…He lost all hope and I didn’t know how to help him, I felt so powerless. It was as if I was allowing his deep sorrow and grief to hold me back from going through my process in losing Nana. Now that he is gone, it’s like I lost both of them at the same time. Very strange and surreal feeling.
Anyway..thank you for putting this into perspective. My Nana has been gone for 17 months now, and I still can’t find the darn memories that I know are in there and that I cherish so much. I hope to figure out how to move beyond the pain and into a space where I can remember the wisdom and the unconditional love that she shared with me. I keep thinking about my Poppi and I hope he is with her somehow, someway, and that they are dancing through the stars together.

~Tara
Always remember the sunshine in your spirit.
Kristie West April 19, 2014 at 5:50 am: Hi Sonya,
You have made such a wonderful step deciding to do some work with Kelly. I know you don’t know how to move forward right now…that is what Kelly is for. I’m really pleased you two will be working together. 🙂
K
xx
Kristie West April 19, 2014 at 5:52 am: Hi Leo,

Thanks for sharing. 🙂

K
xx
Kristie West April 19, 2014 at 5:52 am: You’re welcome Helen, I hope you find it helpful.
K
xx
Kristie West April 19, 2014 at 5:56 am: Hi Tara,
Your Poppi may not have been able to see this…but I’m glad you could. You have the chance to do it all so differently now. And what a wonderful gift to them that would be.
The memories are all in there (this is how my grandmother is able to still recall crazy details from her youth) as you know it is just the pain that pushes them away.
Feel free to get in touch if you want help figuring out how to make that journey.

K
xx