Cam Taylor

Be inspired. Be focused. Be tenacious.

Lessons on Good Grief

This page contains my notes from the “Good Grief Journey Discussion Group.” They are not refined in a publishable format yet but still contain nuggets on my own grief journey that might connect with the journey you are on.

Lesson 1: Laying a Foundation for Good Grief

Introduction

How do you describe grief?

People were asked to describe grief using a metaphor and here are some of the examples (you can think about what you metaphor might be).

  • Grief is like riding a roller coaster that never stops without a seatbelt. ~ Kris
  • Grief is like trying to comprehend what is beyond comprehension. ~Amy
  • Grief is like a shadow. ~Ann
  • Grief is like waiting for a bomb to go off. ~ Joni
  • Grief is like a mixture of recreating an identity and a bittersweet processing of memory. ~Peter
  • Grief is like trying to sort through the rubble of what’s left of your life after the earthquake of loss has hit. ~ Cathy Lee
  • Grief is like walking through hip-high mud. ~ Loretta
  • Grief is like being a walking dead zombie. ~Jackie
  • Grief is like crazy weather. Sometimes showers and storms pop up when you least expect them. ~Laura Jay
  • Grief is like walking in the dark and feeling your way as you slowly go. ~ Deb
  • Grief is like a boomerang, it keeps coming back and wounding you anew. ~Susan

The grief journey is different for everyone yet there are common emotions and experiences that form the strands of connection between those who have suffered due to loss.

“Grief…for those of us who understand, no explanation is needed. For those of us who do not, no description is possible.” – Fran Solomon

In this first session, the goal is to simply connect and begin our journey together – to lay a foundation on which we will build over the next few weeks.

It’s been said, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together” (African proverb). Our desire is to go together and as we go, give you hope in your grief journey.

There are many ways people deal with loss. Some approaches work and some are less than helpful. We want to focus on what it means to walk the “good grief journey.” I want to give you three foundational ideas about what I believe makes GRIEF GOOD.

Three Foundational Ideas that Support Good Grief

1. Grief is good when it’s thorough

When you think of something being good, one way we use that word is this idea of thoroughness. A good person is good in all areas of their. A good meal is all good. A good piece of wood is solid throughout.

Good grief is thorough. It goes to all the places where you need to go to find healing, closure. It goes to the heard places where there are tears and pain because unprocessed hurt remains.

ILLUS — I did a lot of cycling after Vicky died – I coined the phrase, “Grief cycling” because I realized that while on the bike, my grief went deep.

I’d be out in nature and find my heart aching and the tears flowing. I cried deep tears that hurt to let out but as I let them flow and went to that difficult place, it would follow with a little relief even being a bleary-eyed mess. 

But in the mess and in the weeping, I was grateful for my grief was going deep. I welcomed those tears and those painful emotions — just like I welcomed the peace and joy I felt after those tears flowed.

2. Grief is good when you invite God to travel with you

This is hard for some people when they lose someone or something dear to them. They often turn to God and ask Him why? To think of God doesn’t bring much comfort. I certainly wondered why Vicky? Why now? Why at 57?

But eventually if you can muster the courage and faith to say, “Come with me on this journey” — good grief happens.  

Here is an illustration of how it happened one day for me.

I was looking for verses to comfort me in my loss and came across Jesus words in Matthew 5. It’s one of those “are you kidding me?” verses. There are a few of them.

“You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.”  Matthew 5:4

For me it was all about embracing this promise and letting God embrace me in my sorrow and at my lowest point. I embraced the pain and the loss and let God embrace me in a way I had not experienced like that ever before. 

This is a faith step. This is harder for some than others — without question. Nothing about the good grief journey is “easy” but trusting God in my loss opened the door to an experience of closeness I had never before experienced.

3. Grief is good when resiliency becomes the chosen pathway

Early on in my grief journey, a friend recommended a book so I bought it and read it and applied it to my journey. Resilient Grieving: Finding Strength and Embracing Life After a Loss That Changes Everything (Lucy Hone).

The message in that book changed how I saw my journey. I needed to apply what I knew about resiliency to my grief journey. It was a light bulb moment. The things I had learned during other losses and especially the three years recovering from multiple surgeries and much suffering — “apply those lessons and what you learned now in order to bounce forward!”

We’re going to spend more time talking and processing this in a later session so I won’t say much more about it.

In a nut shell, choosing resiliency as your chosen pathway means you will…

  • Be active in your grieving, not passive.
  • Adopt a growth mindset in order to learn what you need to learn to grow and change
  • Choose gratitude even when you’re at your lowest point
  • Look past the darkness to believe that the light will shine again
  • Walk into the pain of loss instead of running from it
  • Make meaningful connections with empathetic witnesses
  • Create routines that will give structure to your aimlessness

Final thoughts

Good grief is thorough, invites God into the journey, and walks forward with resiliency. Good grief is a way to think and a way to live that brings healing and life. Good grief gives hope to the journey – both a destination that you will live again but with a pathway to get there.

Journal Prompts

Here are some different ideas to help you take what we talked about in the first lesson and spend some more time reflecting and processing.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you as you listened and interacted with others during the group?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: Good grief is thorough. In what ways has your grief journey been thorough? In what areas do you see you need to go deeper or further?

Idea #3: In what way have you invited God to travel with you on your grief journey? Where have you resisted His involvement?

Idea #4: Matthew 5:4 says, “You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.”  Journal what you hear God might be saying to you in those words. Now turn that into a prayer back to God.

Idea #5: What does resilient grieving mean to you? How can you strengthen your resiliency as your travel your grief journey?

Lesson 2: Where is God When we Grieve?

Introduction

My perception of God impacted my grief process. I have to say that the way I think about God, relate to him, and see the chain of events that happen has been shaped by what I’ve read, the people I’ve met, the experiences I’ve had with God and with the world around me.

I won’t speak for others but let others speak for themselves and share their own experience.  What I will share is the lessons I learned through trial and error as I integrated my belief system with my loss and grieving process.

There are three lessons that stand out as I reflect back on my journey with losing Vicky this past year and where I found the intersection of God and my journey. 

Lesson 1: I was not in control of what happened.

This issue of control is a big one for me. I’ve lived a lot of my life acting like I was in control. Now I know I’m not but I haven’t always lived that way.

Now, on one level, we do have control. We make choices that have predetermined consequences. We guide our own vessel through stormy and calm seas to a predetermined destination. We take initiative. We go about living. But (and it’s a very big but) if you think you “actually” control the outcome of where your life will go or not go on any given day, it won’t hold up under scrutiny. 

So who is in control?  Is God? I definitely wondered especially when cancer was the diagnosis. I asked that same question back when that car ran the stop sign and pulled out in front of us.  I knew that that moment that I wasn’t in control.

Now if God is in control, why doesn’t he stop bad things from happening?  I wondered that? So many people have.

The way I answered that was to look at the bigger picture of a world that is broken. There’s hurricanes, disease, evil people, humans who make mistakes… God in my opinion “allows things to happen” or not and there isn’t necessarily a clear reason why. It gets down to deciding to focus on what we can control and trusting God when it  makes no sense.

I don’t know of a better way to do it. When Vicky got sick, I prayed for healing but the healing never came. I knew I ultimately had to trust God in the situation. What I could control was my response in the trouble.

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.” — Richard Niebuhr

Lesson 2: The choice I made about how to think about the cancer changed everything. 

We first heard that Vicky had cancer from a random Emergency Dr on March 24th.  I had dropped her off at the curb because Covid restrictions had just kicked in. I had to find a parking lot and wait. But we kept in touch.

I just read that text exchange again this weekend and remember her text like it was yesterday, “The Dr saw my scans and said the word “kidney cancer” but I’m waiting for the oncologist to say. It’s in my lungs – it’s spread everywhere I guess.” My words were, “That’s harsh and a bit premature I’d say.”

Then Vicky’s next words, “I have four months to live.”  I said, “Who said that?”  Her response: “Me.”

I wanted to hate the cancer. God, how could this happen to my sweet Vicky?  It was shocking! 

Now a few days passed and the diagnosis was confirmed. And I found myself in a parking lot journaling and praying and sitting with my thoughts. 

Then I saw it — the bumper sticker!  FU(cancer ribbon). My first thought, “I should send that to Vicky.”  But then I read these words in James 1.

James 1:2-6 (JB Philips) When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives…don’t resent them as intruders, but welcome them as friends! Realize that they come to test your faith and to produce in you the quality of endurance. But let the process go on until that endurance is fully developed, and you will find you have become people of mature character with the right sort of independence.

I realize that day in the parking lot that I had a choice to make. Do I hate the cancer or do I welcome the cancer and let it push me to grow in love, in endurance and into a warmer more compassionate person as a result? 

Lesson 3: I learned to see life as a gift that could be taken away at any moment.

There’s a Latin phrase that I reflected on many times this past year.

MOMENTO MORI – Meditate on your Mortality.  “You could leave life right now.” 

As I saw Vicky prepare for her death, I was struck by how fragile life is. And how much of a gift it really is.  I think God helped me stand back from her death and see the bigger picture. 

Psalm 90:12 Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

I think where I saw God in this was that I was struck by the reality that I can’t extend the time I have by one second but I can live better the life I have.  And live each day as if it were my last — to the fullest with love and engaging in things that matter.

And when I laid my head down on the pillow at night, I decided to as best as I was able, be fully alive each and every day and squeeze all the life out of the day I could.

I think these tie together. Because I stopped resenting the cancer, I had more love for Vicky in the last days we had together. I remember special moments we had — moments of peace and warmth.

I felt God with us. After she left this earth, I felt God with me. Nursing me back to emotional health. Treating life as a precious gift that I didn’t want to squander or treat as a right but as a privilege.

Journal Prompts

Here are some ideas to help you take what we talked about in the second lesson and turn into some time to reflect and journal.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you this week as you listened and shared with others?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: Spend some time with the Serenity Prayer. Read it back to God and then journal the ideas and impressions that came to you as a result.

Idea #3: Take James 1 and read it over a couple of times. What do you hear God saying to you as you read it? Journal your thoughts and feelings.

Idea #4: As you think about Momento Mori, what do you value most about your life right now and is worth celebrating? What will it look like to finish your day well? Journal your thoughts.

Idea #5: Imagine God walking with you on your grief journey.  Create a list that describes the ways he has been with you in your grief.  Examples: God loved me. God suffered with me. God walked with me. God brought people to comfort me.

Week 3: Three Indispensable Legs to Stand On

Introduction

“Grief, when it comes, is nothing like we expect it to be,” Joan Didion observed in her classic meditation on loss.

When Vicky died, I didn’t know what to expect. I remember vividly waking up at 1:30 to my alarm ready to give Vicky by an IV injection, her next dose of pain medicine to keep the pain at bay. She was on her last day or two — I didn’t know.  I had just an hour and half before given her medicine to help with the gurgling sound she was making.

At 1:30 am I went over, grabbed the syringe and when I went over there was no more breath. She had breathed her last at some point while I slept beside her on my bed.

Abraham Lincoln, in a moving letter of comfort to a grief-stricken young woman, wrote of how time transforms grief into “a sad sweet feeling in your heart.”

But I ask, can you trust time to make that slow and steady transition in your heart? Or do you need more? When Vicky first died, I felt like I was having a heart attack. I felt this massive weight on my chest in the night.

I wanted more to go on than just time — it didn’t seem like enough.

In my search for wisdom and guidance in the early days of intense emotion and sadness I was pointed towards a Roman philosopher of all things!  His name was Seneca and he was a Stoic philosopher who wrote on several topics, including grief.

To one woman he writes a letter woke me up to a way to look at grief I had not previously understood. By the way, these consolation letters were used to deliver their philosophy, help people, and give advice to friends who faced a variety of challenges — including grief. 

Marcia (the woman to whom Seneca wrote) had lost her son and her condition had turned into chronic grief — having done on for three years. He warns her, because of how long the grief had gone on, that “he will not go gentle on her…I have determined to do battle with your grief, and I will dry those weary and exhausted eyes…that are weeping more from habit than from sorrow.”

He said something that caught my attention as someone fresh in my grief. He said that normal remedies (that don’t work for prolonged grief) require three things:

  1. the consolation of her friends
  2. the distraction of good books
  3. time itself

He goes on to attempt to shake Marcia out of her grief induced stupor but I want to focus on those normal remedies — because felt that was me! 

I made this into my three legged stool on which I sat and developed a plan around. 

I asked myself a few questions:

1. Who are those friends who can console me?  What’s my role in finding them? Who do I look for?  Do I sit and wait for them to come to me?  Do I reach out to a certain type of person who I know will provide some consolation and comfort? 

2. What books should I read? Who can teach and mentor me in grief?  Where can I go to learn the lessons I wanted to learn to be proactive in my grief, not passive and simply wait for time to pass?

3. As time passes, how should I think of it?  What does meeting opportunity with effort look like?  Is there more I can do with the time that I’ve been given to grieve well and learn to live again?

Here is what I discovered on the journey:

1. I realized that I needed to find empathetic witnesses to my story.

I came across a quote that captured the heart of what I had stumbled upon. 

“Trauma is not what happens to us, but what we hold inside in the absence of an empathetic witness.” ― Peter A. Levine

I realize that not everyone would provide the consolation I needed. Some people weren’t going to help me in my grief. I wasn’t going to judge them, but I wasn’t going to pursue them either.

Thankfully, I had cultivated friendship with empathetic people perhaps because I had developed some empathy before Vicky died that came in handy now that I needed to find people to provide empathy.

EMPATHY IS: “The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.” — Dictionary definition

I realized that I could increase the chances of finding empathy and consolation by talking about my loss — taking the initiative. 

Eg) On one occasion, I was on one of my grief cycling rides and a guy going faster than I came up beside me.  I struck up a conversation with him and eventually told him why I was riding a single bike and not a tandem bike (which I used to always ride with Vicky).  He listened with empathy and understanding. Not trying to give pat answers or say “she’s in a better place” etc. 

He listened and showed compassion then before he peeled up onto a different street, offered to pray for me and in that setting, it was well received as a fellow traveler. 

Seneca had told Maria that she wasn’t helping people console her because she never gave people permission to talk about her son — and that was hindering her grieving and the consolation she could have received.

I think what’s true — you receive what you give. As you develop empathy, you’ll attract empathy from others. Part of this is preparation but I grew in empathy as I chose to listen without giving advice and be with others who were hurting losses of their own.

2. I realized that I didn’t know what I didn’t know — but I could do something about it.  

The four stages of learning anything (including how to grieve) go from “unconscious incompetence” to “conscious incompetence” to “conscious competence” to “unconscious competence.”

When Vicky died, I was pretty much in the dark about how to grieve the loss of my best friend and beloved wife of 36 years. Then, as I inched my way forward through the intense pain of those early days, I eventually was ready to start to be open to new ideas and new insights into this process called grief.

I started slow, reading one book at a time. Listening to messages that brought encouragement. Reading stories of others experience and bit by bit, was learning how to think and act differently than I had known before that.

Knowledge became the handles I could grab onto.

To realize that time was a poor teacher if it’s not paired with wisdom and learning. Time alone become a constant loop in the same experience. Thinking the same thoughts and getting the same result.

Resilient Grieving was such an impactful book because it told me I could be proactive in my grief — and the author was speaking from her own grief journey but also as someone who studies human behavior and psychology.   It because believable and as I tried out the ideas, they worked so it helped me take the next steps.

Her grief model was revolutionary and I adopted it as my own — the puzzle grief model instead of the inadequate Kubler-Ross model and 5 stages of grief which wasn’t even my experience.

Knowledge without application is useless but you can’t apply what you aren’t aware of.

3. I realized that time heals when it’s connected to personal growth and support.

It’s not accurate to say that time makes no difference. I can honestly say that now that almost 9 months have passed, I’m in a very different place that I was six months ago. Time does heal — but only if other factors are at work.

I find a very helpful way to deal with time is to have two ways to think of it. The Greeks had two words for time—chronos and kairos.

Chronos time is defined as something we measure with a stopwatch. It’s what we race against and number our days by. Kairos, on the other hand, defines time as something we measure with a heart rate monitor. Kairos time is movement that can’t be counted. It is more about seasons and less about days.

Both chronos and kairos have a place. However, when we are grieving, learning to tell kairos time can make a big difference. It gets the focus off the clock and onto the learning and the deeper transformation that happens during our grieving.

Kairos is what you need to stop looking at “when will this be over” and look at “what is going on within me that I can process, learn from, mine for deeper meaning?”

Living by kairos time puts you in a poster for reflection, contemplation, being with your pain and loss, and being able to see the good things that are all around you.

Final thoughts

Time doesn’t heal all things. We also need empathetic witnesses, new ideas and thoughts that inspire and instruct and inform us in our grieving journey. Then as time passes, we are able to mine the lessons and experience the healing that will happen as we lean into our grief and let time pass.

TAKE IT TO PROCESS: What was it about that that speaks to you? How do you see that playing out in your own story? Eg. Resiliency. How would you like to see it in your own story?

Note: when people give an example, ask others the same question to see if that has worked with others. Be curious and explore.

Journal Prompts

Here are some ideas to help you take what we talked about in the third lesson and turn it into some time to reflect and journal. If journaling isn’t your thing, try out these questions on a walk or while sitting quietly in a chair.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you this week as you listened and shared with others?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: What practices have you participated in that have helped you in your healing?

Idea #3: What holds you back from reaching out to people in the midst of your grief?

Idea #4: In a paragraph or two, write out your current relationship with grief. What are you feeling? What are you struggling with? What are you looking forward to? Is there something you need to let go of?  

Idea #5: Spend some time reflecting on the following quotes and use these questions to help guide your journaling. [What speaks to you? What causes you to struggle, if any? What thoughts and feelings does this stir up?]

It’s been said that time heals all wounds. The truth is that time does not heal anything. It merely passes. It is what we do during the passing of time that helps or hinders the healing process. Jay Marshall 

No one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear. — C.S Lewis

Tears have a wisdom all their own. They come when a person has relaxed enough to let go and to work through his sorrow. They are the natural bleeding of an emotional wound, carrying the poison out of the system. Here lies the road to recovery. — F. Alexander Magoun

You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present. — Jan Gildwell

Grief is the price we pay for love. — Queen Elizabeth II

Week 4: Resilient Grieving

Introduction

When I think of what I’ve learned about grieving and look at the role models in my life, I often saw grief as something that happened to you. 

People I knew were rolled over by grief and it effected them in a wide variety of ways. I’ve seen some stuck while others, given enough time, seemed to recover and get on with their lives in a new way.

I’m quick to say, I’m still grieving but it’s a much different experience now that it was even two months ago. Now, it’s not as raw or as challenging as it was the first few months. My loss is real but the waves that come now are much smaller in height and intensity. I don’t know how else to describe something indescribable. 

There was some wisdom I learned early on that stuck to me like wet paint on sun dried wood. It was the partnership between resilience and grief.

Those two words were never in the same sentence when I would string my sentences together but when I heard them this time, I said, “Now you’re talking my language.”

Point: There is a certain type of person that can be called “a resilient person.” They are able to cope with grief and do bounce forward after having experienced a loss.

10 Tools That Build Resilience

Dennis Charney and Steve Southwick’s words became the hooks I could hang my journey on. They speak with authority as leading experts in the neurobiology of resilience to stress. They have found that psychological stress alters brain functions; certain identified key factors are related to resilience; and it is very possible to train yourself to be more resilient.

1. Adopt a positive attitude

  • Optimism is strongly related to resilience
  • Optimism is partly genetic (genes are not our destiny — you can learn to be more optimistic).
  • Optimism can be learned
  • Unbridled and unrealistic optimism is not good and gets you in trouble.
  • A truly optimistic person confronts the brutal facts, appraises the situation, but simultaneously believes they will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties.

Example: I believed I would heal but I maintained “I will not guess how this grief journey will play out.”

2. Think flexibly

  • Cognitive flexibility through cognitive reappraisal is strongly related to resilience.
  • Traumatic experiences can be re-evaluated by altering the event’s perceived value and meaningfulness.
  • Benefits can be derived from stress and trauma by reframing, assimilating, accepting, and recovering.
  • Failure can be a tool for growth — FAIL: First Attempt In Learning

Example: Overtalking — failing forward; isolating left me empty so I changed my routines; 

3. Embrace a personal moral compass

  • Developing a set of core beliefs that very few things can shatter is strongly related to resilience.
  • Can take the form of faith in conjunction with strong religious and/or spiritual beliefs
  • Altruism (giving to others) has been strongly related to resilience.

Example: The purpose & value of suffering; the brokenness of the world — not surprised by loss and pain

4. Find a resilient role model

  • Role models are important; they can be found in your own life, but you don’t have to know them (e.g., Viktor Frankl, Nelson Mandela, Abraham Lincoln, Biblical characters like Job or Paul).
  • Imitation is a very powerful mode of learning.

Example: Viktor Frankl certainly is a role model; other Stoics; Nelson Mandela; Friends who have lost loved ones — leaned on them.

5. Face your fears

  • Fear is a normal part of life and can be used as a guide; facing your fears can increase your self-esteem.
  • Learn and practice skills necessary to move through fear.

Example: I was afraid I would forget Vicky but I faced it and pressed on; writing out my memories — I can always go back to my journal to remember. It was an unfounded fear as I get farther along — the memories remain sweet and haven’t faded over time

6. Develop active coping skills

  • Resilient individuals use active, rather than passive, coping skills.
  • Minimize your appraisal of the stressor, create positive statements about yourself, and actively seek support from others.

Example: Journaling; Netflix in short stints was a coping strategy; Walking the dog.

7. Establish and nurture a supportive social network

  • Very few can “go it alone”; humans need a safety net during times of stress.
  • Emotional strength accrues from close relationships with people and organizations.

Example: A weekly threesome I still have going to this day with two empathetic friends

8. Attend to physical well-being

  • Physical exercise has positive effects on physical hardiness, mood, and improves self-esteem.

Example: Grief cycling became my go-to habit and tool for processing my emotions, thoughts and grief.

9. Train regularly and rigorously in multiple areas

  • Change requires systematic and disciplined activity.
  • Concentrate on training in multiple areas: emotional intelligence, moral integrity, physical endurance.

Example: I trained myself on how to think — read & listened to Stoic Philosophy which is very compatible with my Christian beliefs

10. Recognize, utilize, and foster signature strengths

  • Learn to recognize your character strengths and engage them to deal with difficult and stressful situations. Adapted from D. Charney, “The Resilience Prescription.”14

Example: One of my signature strengths is speaking — the first week after Vicky died, I did a speech at my online Toastmasters group on what I had just gone through. It helped me grieve.

Journal Prompts

Here are some ideas to help you take what we talked about in the fourth lesson and turn it into some time to reflect and journal. If journaling isn’t your thing, try out these questions on a walk or while sitting quietly in a chair.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you this week as you listened and shared with others?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: What shows up for you when you bring this idea of resiliency together with your grief journey?

Idea #3: In what ways have you been active in your grieving? What happens in you when you are proactive?

Idea #4: Take action this week by picking one of the 10 tools and applying it in your life.
Example: Pick a role model and read about their life (do a google search or buy a biography).

Example: Identify a strength and find a way to use it to help or serve others.

Idea #5: Spend some time reflecting on the following quotes related to resiliency. Let these questions guide your journaling: What speaks to you? What causes you to struggle, if any? What thoughts and feelings does this stir up?

“Re-establishing routines tells our brains that we are safe, that the crisis period is over, and it’s okay to disarm the red-alert functioning that is our bodies’ reaction to traumatic events. The predictability of routines helps us feel safer, and minimizes stress, anxiety, and hopelessness.”

“Studies show most people make a good recovery from the psychological and social effects of significant disasters, including bereavement. They also show resilience requires very ordinary processes. Karen Reivich describes these processes as a stew, containing lots of different ingredients, some of which we will have in plentiful supply, some we may be running low on.” (both quotes are from Resilient Grieving by Lucy Hone)

Week 4: The Road Less Traveled

Introduction

Grief is a journey different for everyone. That’s why if you hear someone say, “These are the stages of grief” or “This is how you will grieve” or “This is what you’ll experience” — be suspicious. 

There are so many factors to your grief journey that cannot be compared to anyone else.  

For example: circumstances can be very different; how many losses you’ve had in a row effect your grief (especially if left unprocessed); how well prepared you are mentally, spiritually, physically, financially, etc.; the resiliency muscles you’ve developed when the loss happens; your support system; etc.  

To compare yourself to others will often lead to discouragement or jealousy. “Compare and despair!”

You need to find the unique way you will grieve and follow that evolving path. I didn’t know what I didn’t know (remember that unconscious competence diagram? That was me so I found people and learned how to be consciously incompetent and go forward from there).

My eyes were open on how I needed to see my grief journey. I needed a roadmap — some guidance — some handles to hold onto.

I NEEDED HOPE!   Hope is two things: a future expectation — “I would get through this.” But the second part (equally important) — I needed a roadmap to get there.

This is what I learned about that roadmap — and the road less traveled.

The Things I Learned That Gave Me True Hope

1. The one grief model I knew was sadly lacking.

That grief model is the 5 stages of grief — also called the Kubler-Ross grief model. It looks like this:

It was developed by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross after studying the terminally ill and was used to help them die. If you google “grief models” you’ll find it in various forms.  You’d think that it’s the way grief works!  By the sheer volume of options.

But for starters I wasn’t in denial. Vicky was gone. I was not in any form unaware of that fact and was deeply saddened by it but not in denial. I also never felt anger.  I had some anger at the cancer during her illness but it wasn’t an emotion I had to wrestle with. I was definitely sad and broken hearted but depressed?  Not really.

So you can see — just based on my experience alone, this was inadequate. Sure the rolling effect was real but it was not normative.

A better image for how I was emotionally is this picture:

Now, based on what other people were saying about this model — it does give insight into the incredibly emotional roller coaster that grief is especially in the early stages. I’ll give it that…but it didn’t tap into resiliency or getting your life back or moving forward.

It was about this time I started reading Resilient Grieving.  And it was about then when I learned a second lesson.

2. I needed a grief model that encompassed the bigger picture of the grief journey.

And I found one. It was called the puzzle piece model.  It moved the grief journey from stages or nice neat steps to more options to consider. It made more sense to have a tickler trunk of ideas to try on any given day to help facilitate the grieving I needed to do that day.  Since no day was the same, I needed options and it needed to be more fluid and organic — but with intentionality and purpose.

“Living with grief is learning to live in a shattered world where we’re left to rebuild the pieces of our lives.” (Resilient Grieving).

Here’s a sampling of the options I picked from. I did a brain dump of all the items I’d put on a list of “things I did and ways I believed” that helped me grieve. And I stopped at 34 but could have come up with more.

I’d call them “GOOD GRIEF PRACTICES ACTIONS TO TAKE AND THOUGHTS TO THINK.”

It’s a process of discovery, reflection and experimentation. I was surprised along the way. I felt pain but I also felt relief. It helped me keep moving when I felt like giving up.

3. I needed to start living as soon as possible or I would get stuck.

This proactive grief model ensured that I didn’t just focus on my loss but also focused on living again. “Get back to work!” “Learn something new.” “Make a new friend.” “Go on a road trip.”

The opportunity for you is to live life in an expansive way. Having options for living and not being confined to small thinking and small living.

I think covid is doing that to some people. Making them feel like victims with very few options.  I think we need to challenge that limiting belief and get a whole lot more creative. Sure, there are fewer options but the proactive, hopefully person says, “There must be some things I haven’t thought of yet that can brief life back into my soul.”

Final Thought

Your challenge is to take these ideas and build your own grief model both for now and to prepare you for more losses in the future.  I’m still adding actions and thoughts to my puzzle pieces as it continues to grow. In the words of Second First author Christina … “The longer we have been grieving a loss, the harder it is to start living again…we must invite LIFE and GRIEF to walk hand in hand.”

“If life doesn’t escort grief back to joy, then it takes us must longer to get there, if we ever do!”

POINT: You may feel far along in your journey, you can be a mentor to others even if you’re not in the middle of it.

Journal Prompts

Here are some ideas to help you take what we talked about in the fifth lesson and turn it into some time to reflect and journal.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you this week as you listened and shared with others?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: What grief models or ways of dealing with grief have you found inadequate or limiting in light of what you know now?

Idea #3: In your journal, draw your own blank puzzle and fill it in with actions to take or “thoughts to think” that you can call your own.

Idea #4: Take a few moments to consider inviting life to walk hand in hand with grief (if you haven’t already). Write a dialog between life and grief. What do they say to each to encourage one another on the journey?

Idea #5: Spend some time reflecting on the following quotes. Ask: What speaks to you? What causes you to struggle? What thought brings you peace? What thoughts and feelings show up for you?

The longer we have been grieving a loss, the harder it is to start living again…we must invite LIFE and GRIEF to walk hand in hand. Christina Rasmussen, Second Firsts

If life doesn’t escort grief back to joy, then it takes us must longer to get there, if we ever do! – Christina Rasmussen, Second Firsts

You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present. — Jan Gildwell

Grieving is a necessary passage and a difficult transition to finally letting go of sorrow — it is not a permanent rest stop. — Dodinsky

Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process. It needs not a map but a history, and if I don’t stop writing that history at some quite arbitrary point, there’s no reason why I should ever stop. There is something new to be chronicled every day. Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape.  CS Lewis, A Grief Observed

Week 6: Building a New Future

Introduction

By this time in these lessons I want to provide a window into what it was like to move from the struggle to the transition to starting to live forward. I certainly did wonder early on if I’d every find joy again. The sadness was so encompassing but things opened up in time.

At first, I couldn’t imagine feeling joy again or every feeling “light” and unburdened by sorrow.  People would tell me, “it won’t always be this dark. You won’t always feel this sad. You will live again.”  I wanted to believe it but early on wasn’t sure how to get there. 

I pressed on. Slowly but surely I inserted another puzzle piece I had discovered and keep adding pieces to my actions or beliefs. 

Three Activities That Paved the Way Towards the Future

There were several exercises I tried on and I want to share three of the more practical and powerful puzzle pieces I used to help me start to live again.  Inch by inch. Hour by hour. Day by day. Week by week. Month by month.

1. I faced head on the amputation of my familiar self

I found this term in the book “A Grace Disquised” by Jerry Sittser. He helped me get my head around how my identify was so wrapped up your roles and relationships.  He said, “Who we know and what we do, contributes significantly to how we understand ourselves.”  I was a husband. I was a tandem cyclist. I was a couple.  

He said that “Catastrophic loss is like undergoing an amputation of our identify.” Wow, was that so true!

This led me to begin a process of grieving the loss of my identity but in partnership with that, start to imagine the new self I wanted to become.

Viktor Frankl said that without a future, the present loses meaning. “What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task.”

I took to heart the idea that my goals could actually help determine and shape my identity. 

I journaled questions like:

  • What am I trying to accomplish right now?
  • Where did I want to be in 90 days?
  • What is my big picture purpose?
  • What am I grateful for today?
  • Who will my future self look like? 

A quote from last week: “If life doesn’t escort grief back to joy, then it takes us much longer to get there,

2. I learned how to create a positive affirmation for my life.

It started with verbalizing my life with at least five adjectives. I did this on July 15th (2 months after Vicky died). It helped me start to live forward (but to be honest, my emotions were a long way back at this point but I trusted the process).

Here is what I wrote as I started to imagine my life moving forward:

“My life is an adventure of discovery and new beginnings. A massive hole exists where Vicky was but instead of trying to fill it, I’m honoring the memory of her life and legacy while expanding my reach to do things I love. I’m connecting with people I like, engaging in meaningful work and anticipating new friendships, new experiences. I’m learning to laugh again, embracing the tears and diving deep into the transformation that is both for me to experience and share with others. I’m starting to be a guide to those lost and lonely in the grip of their own suffering and despair.”

Then I created a positive affirmation that I wrote out and said out loud at least three times per day.

My positive affirmation statement that I took on my road trip to Saskatchewan went like this:

“My life is a fun adventure of learning, connecting, and discovery.”

During this time, I walked slowly forward — not rushing any of this but trusting the process.

It was during the summer, I’d go for walks, cry, talk about how much I enjoy learning, connecting and discovering new things. It was baby steps. I found music opened up new pathways in my brain.  

3. I realized the power of setting the Survivor free and Inviting the Thriver to Live

There was another journey that really helped me to shift from focusing on the instinct to protect myself from the pain of healing and embrace what was needed to move into my future self.

It’s all wrapped up in creating a new identify as well because I needed to create a new relationship with myself.  We go into survivor mode when we experience a challenging loss.  That is normal, but if we stay there, we stay stuck.  

In my reading, I learned I needed to “set my SURVIVOR FREE!” What?  Up until then, I didn’t realize I was coddling the survivor.  Yes. I was just getting through each day but TREADING WATER, LONELY AND LIVING ON A desert island.

I heard a new name I wanted to use for myself — I wanted to be a Thriver, not just a Survivor.

Letting go of the Survivor was harder than I thought it would be. He protected me from exposing myself to more hurt and unbearable pain. But to move forward, I needed to say goodbye to her. 

THE FIRST STEP — I needed to send my Survivor to a safe place far away.  I chose a beach in Jamaica and walked over the bridge from where I was to that tropical island to drop off my Survivor.  I knew she’d be safe there and far enough away to not return easily.

“Survivor, you’ve been a big help but you’re also holding me back from the people, the creativity and experiences God has in store for me. I can’t have both!”

THE SECOND STEP — With the Survivor occupied on that far away beach, I walked back over the bridge from Jamaica to where I was living and invited the Thriver to be front and center.

I thought about the kind of friendships I liked and what I wanted to create. I started putting wood on the Thriver’s fire.  Experiences I wanted; people I wanted to connect with; experiences I wanted to have.

I cried lots of tears in this process. I had to face that Survivor and the fear of moving forward.

Final thoughts

What I’ve learned after having experienced a few storms, is to live ready and hold life with an open hand. I don’t have an entitlement mindset that life should always be sunshine and warmth. Trauma and loss are part of the human experience.

I’m learning to live in the now. Take life as it comes.  Let God guide my steps and believe that whatever comes, I have Him, friends, a resiliency mindset to see me through.

Hosea 14:5, where God says, “I will make a fresh start with Israel. They will burst into bloom like a crocus in the spring” (MSG). After a season of cold and darkness, he says they’re going to blossom with new beauty like spring flowers.

Journal Prompts

Here are some ideas to help you take what we talked about in the sixth lesson and turn it into some time to reflect and journal.

Idea #1: What insights landed for you during this week’s group as you listened and shared with others?  What did you learn or notice about yourself and your grief journey?

Idea #2: Consider who you want to be in the future. Use these questions to prompt your journaling about future goals and aspirations: What am I trying to accomplish right now? Where did I want to be in 90 days? What is my big picture purpose? Who will my future self look like? 

Idea #3: Write a paragraph to describe your life (use at least 5 adjectives – eg. brave, faithful, eager)

Idea #4: Read this quote and reflect on the question: “When you lose someone you were close to, you have to reassess your picture of the world and your place in it. The more your identity is wrapped up with the deceased, the more difficult the mental work.”

What was your experience when a role changed because of a loss or a lost relationship created a crisis in who you were?

Idea #5: Follow this two-step process to release the Thriver in your life.

First, send your Survivor away to another place. Second, invite the Thriver into your experience. As you do that, imagine the people you’d like to spend time with; tap into your creativity and find a project you’d enjoy working on; finally, move your body in order to create an experience where you feel alive.