Good Grief

This post has been stewing in my head for a couple of months now, but I still don’t know how to start it. So, I guess I’ll just jump right in. My Sister-in-Law died back in March. Processing that fact will, I believe, take a long time and coping with Her loss has been a very bitter pill to swallow. She was such a powerful, positive influence in the lives of Her family and friends that I know we all are feeling intense loss and grief right now. The compounding anxiogenic circumstances of the current Pandemic and resulting social distancing have made this time of grieving more surreal and harsh than they might otherwise be. For me, it has been a time of juxtaposed acute pain and joyful growth. When she passed, I was already mired in a brutal depressive episode and so I’ve been able to compare and contrast the pain of severe, clinical depression with he pain of overwhelming loss and grief. I can’t say that I’ve enjoyed the last couple of months, but they have been deeply instructive.

 

I’d be lying if I said it’s been easy for me to see the silver lining of things lately, and yet I feel like many enlightening and encouraging truths have been revealed to my mind and heart in the last few months. The recurring message that I’ve been receiving is that pain and grief and love and joy are intricately and divinely intertwined and inextricably linked. I know that it is not a novel idea that you can’t have love without loss, but the depth and certainty to which my soul has been taught this truth as of late compels me to talk about it and share the deepest contents of my heart. Many times, maybe dozens, over the last couple of months I have had the distinct impression that loss and grief are actually among the most sacred and joyous emotions we can experience and express in life because intense grief is the purest and most sure evidence of intense love and adoration. I have felt strongly that the price of joy is love and the price of love is loss. Eternal joy is the ultimate goal and destination of human existence and love is the only way to get there. Since it is impossible to truly grieve without having truly loved we should take our pain of loss as irrefutable proof of our true love for the person we have temporarily lost. Knowing this will not erase our pain, but it is a sweet comfort and a tender mercy.

 

If we desire to live in congruence with this simple truth then we must, somehow, no matter how impossible it feels, learn to accept and even embrace our tragedies and losses with faith, love, and joy. I’ve been given many opportunities to practice this heavenly process over the last 7 or 8 years as I have descended into the depths of despair and back up again and then back down even further than before and then back up to the surface for a panicked gulp of air and then back down again, over and over and over again. I have been gradually stripped of all my dreams and aspirations, but I haven’t lost hope. I am still suffering, but now I am suffering for a purpose. At the end of the day no matter what else I have lost I still have love. And receiving and giving that love is worth any price of grief or pain. I believe this is essentially what makes life worth living. We must choose to live for love and we prove our love by facing our tragedies head on and honoring the loved ones we have lost. We honor our lost loved ones by collectively and individually giving to others the love that they gave to us.

 

I believe that even in our deepest agony and despair we can find the strength to go on by making love the focus of our lives. By doing so we may not eliminate the suffering of our lives, but we can make it worth it. We must choose to acknowledge and accept the love manifested all around us and we can share it in one way or another with everyone we meet. After all that’s what Noelle would do.