Grief
Such a small word carrying such a heavy load. Just let the word roll around on your tongue a little.
Grief. Grief stricken. Wrought with grief. A heart heavy with grief. People talk about patterns of grief, stages of grief, waves of grief and being in the grip of grief, consumed by grief. Sometimes we can even come to grief if we’re not careful.
A small word with a powerful emotion -suffering, distress, sorrow, misery, despair, heartache, pain, regret and affliction in one, tiny, word.
We can grieve for anything, the loss of life, the loss of love, the loss of a relationship, our youth, health, happiness, a home, our freedom. Good grief.
How can we possibly be happy or positive, how can we go on or move forward when we are grieving?
Would we be denying that the very thing we are grieving for ever existed if we did?
Are we denying the existence of grief itself and will it come back to haunt us later?
Can we be happy while still grieving?
What if we were to talk about memories instead?
Stages of memories, patterns of memories, waves of memories. What if we could allow those memories to wash over us, to become overwhelmed and consumed by the love felt in our memories and the happiness that those memories evoke?
What if, through those memories, we could see ourselves in a place of comfort, a place of happiness, of love and joy and recognise how strong, positive and fulfilled we were then; how we enjoyed that life and how we enjoyed making those memories?
What did we spend all that time making memories for, if not to enjoy them on playback and revel in them, using them for comfort in harder times?
What if we could move forward with our memories, confident that the version of us in the memory will show up to make the now a little easier to live in? The strong version of us, the positive version, the happy, fulfilled and joyful version. The version that could overcome anything. What if that version of ourselves could take those memories and turn them into a pocketful of dreams, to take with us wherever we go next...
