Grief is a universal teacher. To grieve well is to meet what is arising with kindness and a welcoming heart. To bring your full presence to what is hurting.
In Western culture, we are taught to be strong when we’re sad and to hold it together. Somewhere in our development, we started seeing grief as weak, something to hide, something to fix when, in truth, grief is the heart’s way of healing.
To grieve, we must allow ourselves to feel the loss without the weight of blame or regret. When we strip away all the stories about our loss and feel the sadness, meeting that reality with kindness, we create the space for healing. The heart knows how to grieve; she knows how to feel the pain and keep beating
The world’s wisdom traditions tell us that grief is sacred, a natural part of life. They tell us to look to the earth’s teachings—that breaking and letting go is part of life. The rain must fall, the storms must rage, and the rivers must overflow because new life is born from that cleansing. Grief is no different. It washes through us, cleansing the spirit, softening the hard places where we have tried to hold on too tightly to brace ourselves against our losses.
Grief is not something to be rushed or hidden away. It is the heart’s way of making sense of what has been lost.
On grief, I have come to know this: There is no shame in breaking open and feeling the full weight of what you have lost. Grief is not a failure but a release—a making of space. When we grieve deeply, we honor what has passed. We honor what we have lost. When we grieve, we cleanse; we make room for new life to take root.
Dear one, feel your grief. Let it rise like a tide. Let it move through you as a sacred current, carrying you to the deeper truths of who you are. Do not judge your tears. Do not think you must be "over it" by now. The heart has its own timing and its own way of healing, and it is not bound by the clocks of our world. We must mourn what is gone, whether it is a person, a moment, a dream, a love that has slipped away, or a part of yourself that illness, abuse, or hardship has taken.
You are allowed to feel the depths of your sorrow. It is in these depths that the seeds of healing are planted. And one day, when the time is right, those seeds will grow into something new. Something beautiful. You are grieving, yes, but you are also healing.
I have come to know that grief is a companion on the road of life, one who walks beside us, whispering of the things we need to release so that we can be free.
