OUR ANGRY COUNTRY NEEDS TO GRIEVE
By Judith Parker Harris | November 5, 2009
BLOCK #51, UNEXPRESSED GRIEF: If you’re wondering what happened to Blocks 1 through 50, they are all on Twitter, I just didn’t number them. My challenge is to bust 365 blocks. I will do it regularly, but not always daily.
Today, I am still stewing over yesterday’s post concerning a friend receiving the news of her grandfather’s death through a post on her Facebook wall. This has led me to bust the Block of Unexpressed Grief. Why would someone do that? Because, we don’t make time to grieve – it’s just plain inconvenient to slow down and have to comfort someone – or even ourselves. We’re too busy with our lives to stop and recognize the sadness that underlies our disappointment, so we blow off in an angry outburst instead. (Sometimes angry tears that surprise us.)
There is an oppressive layer of sadness in our lives today. Often, you can feel it in the air. You can certainly see it on people’s faces, in their gait, in their eyes, in their tired demeanor. Sadness is triggered by past memories when they represent unfinished business. Lynn Andrews writes in her Power Deck that “grief introduces you to parts of yourself that are not yet healed…It is said that the seeds of wisdom and enlightenment are planted within the wounds of grief.”
I don’t think it’s necessary to list all the reasons why we’re sad, just a few suffice. It’s the shock and residual pain of the “Great Recession.” It’s the disappointment in the leadership we feel we can no longer trust. It’s the fact that life as we were taught it would be – isn’t. It’s living with terrorists and terror every day in a post 9/11 world where we know we are not invincible. It’s the fighting over 1900 pages of a healthcare bill that has morphed into an ugly bi-partisan debate. But, that’s the big picture.
Let’s take it to the personal picture level for a moment. It’s dealing with the aging of your parents or a loved one and feeling like you are losing them one little piece at a time. How many people, things, dreams and expectations are we losing one little piece at a time?
I urge you to take a look behind you and make a list of all the things that need to die in your life: False hopes, dead-end jobs, damaging love affairs, inherited prejudices, negative lessons, versions of yourself that no longer hold true. Say good-bye! Allow yourself a good cry. Visualize pain floating out of your eyes on tear boats. Be glad to see the pain depart. You can cry alone. But don’t be ashamed. Rant and rave if you need to. Flail your arms, kick your legs, LET IT GO!!! Keep the wonderful memories and choose how to cherish them in your lives, but say good-bye to the FINISHED BUSINESS that can hold you back as long as it hides out in your body as unexpressed grief.
During intense periods of grief, it also helps to talk to professionals. In addition to self-help groups, grief recovery groups and groups dealing with your particular loss or crisis are available. Release your grief and you will defuse the pressure cooker of anger, clearing the path for peace and contentment again. You will be much more capable of dealing with what is, when it is no longer attached to what was. Don’t be afraid of grief, it is truly a vehicle for rebirth.
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