Grief is hard. Its damn hard.
It has its own agenda and timing. There is no warning for it. It can make life feel devastatingly out of control and extremely painful.
I know. Ive been going through it for a couple of years now.
My brother in law died in 2019..then a month later the love of my life (who I secretly still adored and was friends with) died suddenly too. I had only spoken to him days prior.
There is no warning. There is no preparing for this. It is shocking, traumatic and extremely destabilising. Not to mention damn fucking hard.
Those first 6 months were a blur. I don't know how I survived. But I did. I remember the screaming pain and then moments of utter spiritual grace. Small miracles, synchronicities and loving support. Then facing it all..alone.
Over time I created coping mechanisms (some I still have) when I wasn't actively healing. And after a while I saw that I also used them to avoid the grief.
Some days the grief comes, and it takes me out for days. So much inner turmoil. So much judgement and aloneness because life is just going on around you, yet you feel stuck in time. I had so much shock in my emotional body that I had to subconsciously store it in my actual physical body.....Im still healing that to this day. So it comes in waves, and being an emotional healer....I know the importance of allowing this to happen. But its still damn hard.
It takes time. It takes so much damn time, but you still have to somehow live, earn money and get on with it, even though your inner world is screaming for relief. Some days I take it like a champ and others...well I just have it admit...I can't fucking show up today...its just too damn much.
So here I am, a couple of years later. I do feel more hope generally, but the grief still comes, and the wanting to avoid it gets bigger.
You see...I want to move on. I want to feel something different. I want the victorious moment of "wow everything really worked out in the end". I want the peace. But the damn grief is still there. Its there because every piece of the "new" comes with its piece of letting go of what was. And I know that....deep down...I really know that. But I don't want to do it.
I want to skip this part.
The more I walk into the new...the bigger my grief gets. The more I have to accept...this is how it is. I am walking without him being there. And the mind can really trick you into thinking the more you walk, the further you get from that person, or thing you lost. You can also get tricked into thinking, things are going to be worse...and you believe it...because the grief is there and it can sometimes feel as fresh as the day it happened.
Lately I've been devastated that the "new" isn't coming fast enough. It isn't big enough. And I realised I want it to come fast, because I don't want to re-feel all of this damn loss again. I don't want to feel and face that huge mammoth piece of grief that is the final acceptance.....the grand finale of grief.
That he is gone. Really gone. What I really wanted in my heart of hearts, will not happen in the way I truly desired. My happy ending didn't happen with him. And every step I take, solidifies this. If I stay where I am, in this ambiguous place, he is still kinda here. I still don't have to do that final scary surrender into the devastation. I can be safe and comfortable in this slow sadness.
This shit is gonna hurt. Its gonna hurt like a mofo. And I know it. And I don't wanna feel it. Thats why nothing is happening. Thats why life can't give me the new.
I do not trust this final pain. I do not trust in my ability to meet it. Even though I've walked it thousands of times. I barely made it out then!
But yesterday, upon talking to my sisters who are in the same boat (bless them) in their different ways....I realised with them...that what is really scary is that we are believing that if we finally accept this....we are accepting our undeserving-ness. Our unworthiness.
Its like a part of us is believing that if we finally accept this ending we have to admit defeat.
We are underserving of having the thing we really wanted with the person we really loved. We must be unworthy because this didn't work out. That our lives are destined to be hard with suffering. That we are undeserving of having love work out.
That maybe, really, its a deep undeserving of love itself. And a deep accepting that we don't trust love and we can't....not after this.
And that, is really what hurts. That this experience and the accepting of it, will mean this...and we will have to accept it.
But what if its just the acceptance that we were and are believing this, and that is all that needs to be let go? What if its just the unloving beliefs we have been afraid were true? Maybe we have been confusing what needs to be let go with what we wanted and loved?
Its not that I have to let go of my love and connection to my loved one, its what Im taking this situation to mean about me and my life going forward. Because I can't stop loving him. Thats the truest part of this. I know he is still there, in spirit. But it doesn't mean Im not loved. It doesn't mean he doesn't love me and this is all a mistake. It doesn't mean I didn't deserve an awesome life with someone I loved. It doesn't mean I failed. And it doesn't mean I am undeserving of having its equal, if not better experience. My relationship to him has transformed...thats all. Its different now. But I can still honour what I want for my life and transform my perspective and narrative around it.
Because what if this experience was actually supporting me to live my fullest life? What if it came to show me my deepest fears and barriers to living a life full of passionate love? What if its trying to show me the very things I thought it was taking away?
That I am loved.
I am connected.
I am worthy and deserving of receiving.
That life will be easy for me.
That the divine loves me.
I can trust myself, my life and the unfolding.
That I am supported to live this beautiful life.
Endings are not taking things away. What truly matters will be preserved and will be the seed for the new chapter. What needs to be let go is what is unloving and unsupportive for the new.
We just need to know how to sort what from what.
May you have the loving clarity you need to know the difference.
