We are in the midst of a collective grief cycle. It’s important as we move through it that we REMEMBER it is a cycle (I’m always going to come back to What We’ve Forgotten).
Remembering that we have emotions and are not our emotions (Thank you for this Teaching Sandra Ingerman!). And that when we hold ourselves closed or we move into trauma responses we are literally holding closed a system that is meant to remain open.
What do I mean by that?
Try to think of yourself as a hose (or a straw) with openings at both ends. We know instinctively with a hose, if we want water to move through it, we have to make sure both ends of the hose are open. The hose can’t be bent or detached.
It has to be attached to the source and open in order for water to pass through the hose. When we clench and hold on to our emotions, it prevents us from being able to be connected to source but it also prevents us from clearing the line.
If you’ve ever had a water main flushed – you know what I mean, you need to run the water and clear the line in order for the water to become pure. Otherwise you get sediment, it’s not pleasant to drink. This is the EXACT same way with your nervous system, and energetic system – even your digestive system. Source is smart. They drop great clues for us in our own biology of how this works.
Grief is a cycle of emotions. The best way to move it through is to accept that the line has to be open, in order to move into the next cycle. That when we aren’t acknowledging that it is something that is moving through we are lost in it. The water isn’t clear, it’s unpleasant to taste and if we just open the line, if we just run more water, eventually – it passes.
We know that with plumbing, why don’t we know that about emotion? or grief? How have the waters gotten so very muddy?
Because we don’t allow ourselves the grace, the space to actually FEEL it. We have forgotten it but it’s also been stolen from us by systems of oppression. As we are all experiencing collective grief it’s important to understand – not everyone is in the same cycle. Some people are in denial, some people are bargaining, some people are ANGRY, some people are depressed and some people have accepted the changes and are moving into action to help others. Instead of dividing, and fighting, it’s time to recognize that we are all in the same state – but not in the same cycle.
Of course the people in the anger cycle are not going to be accepting. Of course the people in a depressed cycle are beyond anger, etc. We have to begin to see one another as the emotionally complex triangles we are. Mind. Body and Spirit and that in these times, that we can hold space for everyone. We can lighten one another’s loads by simply identifying the cycle.
I was honored to take part in an important conversation about grief with Missing Witches with Lightning Struck Gardens’ Kristen Renaud, Author of Redbird – Diandra Ford Wing. I hope you enjoy, and that it brings some new light into your gardens.
May the cycles be kind to you. May you remember that kindness is suicide prevention – and it’s free.