Head & Heart #48: On grief

Some things I've learned and hold on to...

1. From a recent instalment of Madeleine Dore’s wonderful email newsletter….

“Some necessary things are impossible,” says Clare.

“And some impossible things are necessary,” says Felice.

— Tennessee Williams, The Two Character Play

Life after loss demands both the impossible and the necessary. The horribly hard, unimaginable, impossible conversations that are necessary to have and decisions that are necessary to make. And the mundane, ordinary, necessary daily tasks (like buying toilet paper) that suddenly feel completely impossible.

2. Buying toilet paper in the throes of grief is something I have thought about often since listening to this episode of ‘Terrible Thanks for Asking’ about a woman who is navigating the loss of her best friend. Warning - this episode made me weep and immediately text my best friend to tell her how much I love her.

3. This line from Samuel Beckett - "I can't go on, I'll go on." - which I first came across quoted in Paul Kalanithi's 'When Breath Becomes Air'.

4. Grief comes in waves (often when you least expect them). Much like getting caught in literal waves in the ocean, sometimes all you can do is surrender and just try to keep breathing as it washes over and around you.

I have learned that Grief is a force of energy that cannot be controlled or predicted. It comes and goes on its own schedule. Grief does not obey your plans, or your wishes. Grief will do whatever it wants to you, whenever it wants to. In that regard, Grief has a lot in common with Love. The only way that I can “handle” Grief, then, is the same way that I “handle” Love — by not “handling” it. By bowing down before its power, in complete humility.” ~ Elizabeth Gilbert (quoted in the Brain Food newsletter).

5. In Leigh Sales' book, 'Any Ordinary Day' she talks about 'accompanying' people through grief. This language has been so helpful for me in supporting people I love as they grieve. As a natural fixer, it reminds me that often the most useful thing I can do is be willing to sit with someone in the dark before rushing to switch on the light (HT to Brené Brown for the darkness/light switch metaphor).

6. David Kessler on Brené Brown's ‘Unlocking Us’ podcast (also quoted in ‘Atlas of the Heart’…

Each person's grief is as unique as their fingerprint. But what everyone has in common is that no matter how they grieve, they share a need for their grief to be witnessed. That doesn't mean needing someone to try and lessen it or reframe it for them. The need is for someone to be present to the magnitude of their loss without trying to point out the silver lining.

7. From the same episode of ‘Unlocking Us’, I learned about the tendency toward comparative suffering as well as the 'parable of the long spoons'. We only get through any of this by feeding each other.

8. More from Brené in conversation with Susan David on the ‘Dare to Lead’ podcast:

As a child, I remember that no matter how hard it was and how awful it was, we were taught “You do not turn away from pain. You look people in the eye.”

9. When I was younger, there were times I failed to reach out to those experiencing loss out of fear of saying the wrong thing or making them feel uncomfortable. I regret these failures of kindness. As explored in this ‘Hidden Brain’ episode, we often underestimate the positive impact our actions can have. Now I always make an effort to send the message and say something regardless of how awkward or risky that may feel.

Rather than doing something, even if it's small, many of us hold back. We worry we will be awkward, or that our kindness will be misconstrued. Yet, when we are on the receiving end of small kindnesses, we are often moved to tears. This paradox plays out every day, robbing us of opportunities to offer kindness, and opportunities to receive it. ~ Hidden Brain, A Secret Source of Connection

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Shiny Things

(A handful of things that have got my attention right now. HT to the ‘Hacking Your ADHD’ podcast for the new title for this section).

• Reading: Poetry with E before bed. E (almost 10) is a competent and voracious independent reader but I miss the ritual of reading stories out loud. I’ve recently started reading her one of the poems from This is Home: Essential Australian Poems for Children each night.

• Experimenting: New tech tools to help me focus - Llama Life (HT to Steph Clarke for this one) and Sesh.

• Making: Sourdough. 3 years behind this trend, but thanks to a class at Kookery I’ve learned the basics and am enjoying the physicality and pace of the practice, as well as the outcome (fresh bread really is one of life’s simple pleasures).

• Reading: The Good Enough Job. I’ve been thinking a lot over the last few years about the role that work plays our lives and identities, grappling with redefining my own relationship with work, and supporting clients, colleagues and friends to do the same.

  We shouldn’t work less just because it allows us to be better workers. We should work less because it allows us to be better humans.

• Wearing: Boody weekend joggers. I’m definitely in a season of my life where comfort dictates much of my clothing choices. These pants do not disappoint!

• Using: Sharpie S-Gel pens. Life is too short for shitty pens.

• Listening: Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ new podcast, Wiser Than Me (HT to my friend Emily for recommending this). Similar concept to two other podcasts I really enjoyed… Sugar Calling and 70 Over 70.

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Photo: Starting the weekend in the best possible way - parkrun @ Myponga Reservoir on land traditionally used by Kaurna, Ramindjeri, Ngarrindjeri and Peramangk people.