The Grief Practice - An Exploration & Explanation of Grief In The Body

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Sometimes we can think surviving is all there is.

Sometimes we can think surviving is all there is. We get so used to having to work so hard to be okay or get up or get through that we can forget our true capacity as human beings that are wired to survive and to thrive.
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Our window of tolerance is a good place to start and work with both physically, emotionally and energetically, strengthening the container for what we can hold, tolerate and befriend. A n d there may come a time when we have the resources, support, circumstances to stretch our hearts again, to risk it all again, to live fully again.
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Pulling back is natural, we know what it’s like to lose it all. And sometimes it is that the bravest thing we do is open our heart to the world again and let in all the things that feel good.
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief #hope

Feeling stuck, numb, hopeless, or hopeful, losing

Feeling stuck, numb, hopeless, or hopeful, losing heart or taking heart, depressed, anxious, lonely, like we want to die or don’t know how to live, not being able to stop moving or not being able to start... these are some of the ways humans respond in grief.
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What we don’t always recognize is that these responses are driven by our biology, specifically our autonomic nervous system, how it’s primed from a lifetime of experiences, our current felt experience and social support systems to instinctively respond to our unique kind of loss.
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Understanding the science behind our somatic, felt experiences gives us access to more compassion for our unique responses, behaviors, coping mechanisms and overall experience of grief.
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Learn more in The Grief Practice book, book a private online session, or bring my Grief In The Body workshop to your community xox
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #griefinthebody #polyvagaltheory #grief #yogaforgrief #traumainformedyoga

Healing is a process of integration more than one

Healing is a process of integration more than one of releasing.
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We might remarry, have another child, mend those deep attachment rifts created when our person died, heal in many ways and forms in our outer life and still have moments of reinhabiting and re-embodying that deep, eviscerating pain or sense of hopelessness. Maybe it softens into waves of tears we can rock ourselves through or maybe it shows up ten years later as hot anger that seems to come out of nowhere.
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The body remembers dates, anniversaries and subtleties in ways we may not even be aware of. Scents, sights, sounds, sensations can speak to grief in a way words never can.
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There is nothing to release and everything to hold on to. Your amazing body and the way it adapts and grows around and through tremendous pain. Your resilient spirit that sometimes shuts down to survive. Your intelligent mind that can coax the body back into safety with its kind words and support.
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We humans can hold it all, for ourselves, for each other. Let’s do this and show the world how it’s done.
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief #griefinthebody #polyvagaltheory #bottomup #topdown #integration #healing

There is a difference. . The wholeness we are all

There is a difference.
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The wholeness we are all born with is not compromised by our life experiences. We are not the sum of our parts or experiences. This is often understood as the "being" part of "human being."
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Someone we love dies. We feel less whole. We feel broken. We feel unwelcome "as we are" in society. We feel we have to "fix" ourselves or hurry up or act happy or less sad.
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These are valid, felt experiences made up of instinctual biological responses, sensations, emotions, and thoughts. This is often understood as the "human" part of "human being."
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Wholeness includes our entire experience of being human, meaning our pain and our love and our anger and our sadness all make up being a whole human.
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We often leave parts of our self at the door. Maybe when we come home or leave home, enter a public space or engage with certain humans.
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The parts of us we leave behind start to feel separate or shamed, like they are unwelcome or not good enough or too ugly to be part of the rest of our life.
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It's hard work, this being human. Grief often magnifies things about ourselves we never noticed before. Our instincts kick in on a deep, primal level. There is no hiding them or running from them. Our bodies and minds try to cope the best we can.
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When we viscerally "feel" broken, it can be hard to remember we are actually still whole. That this feeling of brokeness is part of our wholeness. That rejecting or exiling this broken feeling of ours is actually what makes us feel less whole.
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You don't have to leave your whole self at the door. It takes courage and vulnerability to allow ourselves to be whole human beings especially in relationship with others and the world.
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief #broken

Our Hearts are the first home for our grief, start

Our Hearts are the first home for our grief, starting with the moment we feel them break or collapse in our chests. It lands here, the news, the struggle, the goodbyes we exchanged or never got to say.
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How we feel, good or bad, affects the physiological state of our heart, creating heart rhythms that are scrambled or ones that are more coherent.
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Bathing the literal heart in positive thoughts and feelings has been shown to improve heart rate variability, a key player in overall health and longevity.
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In addition to being impacted by our feelings and thoughts, our hearts are affected by our breath. Our inhales speed up our heart rate and our exhales slow them down. These fluctuations in our heart rate are an indicator of good heart-rate variability, a strong indicator of health and well-being.
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Traditional Chinese Medicine assigns joy, and the lack of joy, to the heart. The expression "losing heart" speaks directly to the energy and aliveness the heart is the container for. Feeling empty-hearted or like our heart is literally breaking is common when grieving.
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The physical sensations we experience in the heart are communicated to the brain via the vagus nerve, the BodyMind neuroreceptors, as well as the heart's "brain."
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We are affected by our own heart energy as well as that of other humans, as our hearts have an energetic field that extends up to eight to ten feet.
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People heal people. When we engage in authentic, meaningful connections, even briefly or with total strangers, to our bodies these interactions feel like love. Yes, love!
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This kind of love and connection can be a soothing salve to the deep loneliness that often accompanies grief, as even perceived loneliness has physiological consequences.

Since the heart can be highly charged, both positively and negatively, keeping this in mind as we explore our grief can guide us in choosing what supports our process. Sometimes tuning into the heart can feel supportive and healing. Sometimes it can feel overwhelming and scary.
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(“The Heart”, p.93 of The Grief Practice book)
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#onwardcourageousheart #grief #love #love2point0

Opening up to other humans doesn’t always feel w

Opening up to other humans doesn’t always feel welcome or safe in grief. We still need comfort, though. Still need understanding, to not feel alone, to feel accompanied.
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The first thing I did after my husband died was go to my local bookstore. Books had always showed me the way until then, always made me feel less alone.
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But as a 25-year-old widow who experienced a traumatic loss with major depression I didn’t find anything that spoke to me back in 2002, before the rise of the wonderful modern grief groups, voices, conversations and online communities we currently have.
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Written words allow us to open privately, be comforted, soothed, related to without fear of being judged or having to interact. They allow us to return to them or hold them close in whatever way helps us most.
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When we can’t find our own words other people’s can say what we feel, give our feelings feet and provide a light from which to climb down into our experience.
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Humans need humans, there is no doubt about that. And sometimes we don’t have access to other humans or the right kind of humans.
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That’s where words can save us.
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief

Beauty has saved me in grief. It reminded me of my

Beauty has saved me in grief. It reminded me of my unbroken parts and gave me a hint of the joy I still had access to one glance, waft, sound at a time.
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In the beginning making something beautiful out of my grief was never a conscious thought. Yet as I began to put the pieces of my experience together I began to realize beauty was a nonnegotiable piece. I would not, could not proceed without it.
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Maybe you get a sense of that when you look at my page or flip through the pages of my book. It’s how I respect the part of us that lives on. It’s how I honor my unique path as I support your unique path. Grief can be so painful, ugly and heavy. It can cut us off from every hope and every help. It can reveal the most raw, untamed, primal side of ourself. When we see or smell or hold or experience or witness something beautiful we see that part of ourself we may have forgotten reflected back to us without having to exile or deflect our pain. We have a momentary experience of how it’s possible for them to coexist.
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It’s not about finding beauty in grief or even making something beautiful out of our grief. It’s about remembering that our humanity is not diminished by our pain. That something as fleeting or seemingly unnecessary like beauty actually holds so much healing.
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What is the most beautiful thing you’ve experienced this week?
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief #beauty

As humans, when things go wrong or become overwhel

5 things grief taught me: . ✨Grief taught me tha

5 things grief taught me:
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✨Grief taught me that sometimes I don't have to let it go. I just have to let it out.
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Through writing, words, movement, tears, screaming at the top of my lungs or whispering to the world. The way into grief was very narrow, but the way through was up to me.
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✨Grief taught me that releasing is not the same as relinquishing.
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My grief is mine forever. When I release it into the world through words or conversation or tears, it is free to leave for a while or return right away, the same or changed but always welcome in my heart.
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✨Grief taught me what it means to be vulnerable.
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Not in the ways we choose to be vulnerable. In the way life tears down every wall we've built, every label we've claimed, every role we've identified with and reveals a broken, beating heart that is not sure if it wants to live or die. When I brave the flood of tears that makes me feel so exposed and vulnerable I find the dock of another human heart waiting to hear what I have to say.
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✨Grief taught me I am not alone.
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Even when no human could comfort me, mother nature was soothing me with her bright moons, wild oceans and dancing flowers. She was teaching me something about human nature, about darkness and light, about the cycle of life and love. She was taking my words and echoing them back to me, blurring their edges on the journey so they sat a little softer in my soul upon returning.
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✨Grief taught me loss expands before it shrinks.
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I didn't just lose a human being I loved. I lost the sound of their feet in the hallway, the water running as they brush their teeth, the sight of their face down the hall, the sound of their voice on the phone, the ability to reach out and touch them.
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(A piece I published a few years back on HuffPost that is still so close to my heart, which is why I share it with yours💞)
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#onwardcourageousheart #griefisapractice #healingisanart #grief #healing

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