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T O P I C R E V I E WHedgewitchwhat exactly is grief?why is it necessary?why does it seem so minimized in this culture?how should one work through it ina healthy, cathartic way?i'm baffled by the concept of grief,and its mechanism. earlier this yeari was in need of chiropractic care forsome injuries, and the chiropractorquestioned me about some personal things.as i began to tell her, a string of relatedevents rose to the surface, and i wentinto emotional meltdown. she was shocked, and said that i hadnumerous experiences hidden away inside,and that i seriously needed to allowmyself to grieve for many of these incidences.i was so surprised to hear that....i had never considered the grieving processa necessary component in my life. shesuggested talking to someone who couldhelp me unlock the grief i held inside,and allow my self the grieving i needed.i didn't contact anyone about facilitatingthis, but the thought has stayed with me,and i continue to ponder, at times, theidea of grief, what it is, and how to allow it to operate successfully in one'slife...i'm surprised to find how little i reallyunderstand it....and how little exposureit has in our world.the grieving process ~does anyone know about grief, and how itmanifests in our lives, for healingor otherwise?i'm beginning to believe it's a strongnecessity, that we neglect all too often.loving kindness to all who yearn,Hedgewitch trillianHedgewitch I know a few things about grief. I know enough to know that like love, it is highly personal and defined only by she who grieves. I am sorry if this answer seems flip; that's not my intention. I will ponder this and see if I can find a better answer for you. However, I suspect in the Yin and Yang of life it is simply another experience for us. ------------------The less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine. -Indigo Girlssue gI too......am no stranger to grief...consider myself to be a bit of an expert.....Mmmmm....I came into this life grieving....didnt understand it until very recently...I brough in trauma and sadness from another existence......it confounded me at times...went against the lightness and joy of my personality..tis only now I understand the need to do it....That is why I cry at lot...and wail (not of late), but I would go out look up into the heavens and scream...and not know why.......but I do now....and it feels good..... love to allSue G xxxxthirteenI remember reading that unexpressed grief can be a cause for depression. I began to allow myself to basicall grieve for any loss or any change in my life. As an example , when my husb and I met we worked together. We had a lot of fun then. We moved and changed jobs. We still work together but his role is so much more serious now, there is no time for fun. I had to greive that change and really tune in to my feelings of loss, sadness,and whatever emotions came up. I had to really let myself feel the bad emotions before they stopped having an effect on me. As I write this it just occurred to me I have not let myself grieve over the changes in my mother after her heart attack and the family changes since gram had to be placed in a nursing home. I miss the old days. How we all used to hang out at family get togethers. Things are very different now. I need to ponder that one more in private. Doing these exercises has helped me a lot.sue gI really felt what you wrote thirteen......... Every time someone "lets me down" I allow myself to grieve....I may only have known this person a short while, but even so it triggers "past" memory and evokes a similar feeling......I allow the hurt to surface....Everytime someone "stabs me in the back" because of their inadequacy, as well as dealing with it by saying "its their problem , their low self esteem"......I also allow myself to grieve....Eveytime I do this......I become a stronger person because I have allowed myself to feel so deeply and release that.....I also become healthier and happier....Every time Ive tried to supress a feeling, I have become angry, depressed and then physically ill.....So I suppose in short grieving is necesary for good health and a happy and free mind........ loveSue xxxHedgewitchthank you ladies for these verypersonal portraits of grief andhow it interacts in our lives.i'm just confounded by it, becausei never encountered the concept atall growing up, and in my adultyears, moving at an ever fasterpace, there was no time foracknowledging or understanding grief.especially as something separate andquite different from depression....which i tend to dismiss in my ownlife, as for me, i think it's misusedas a manipulative label. there'sabsolutely nothing wrong with feelingsad, about events, or people....oranything, in fact i think it's ratherhealthy to allow oneself to experiencesadness....but it seems that in thisculture, feelings are maniputlated forcontrol purposes, thus being sad is turnedinto an illness.....i do agree that depression can be a real phenomenon, but that if wewould allow our feelings more reignit might not manifest in the firstplace.but the idea of grief extends beyondsadness....as something that's anecessary component to a traumaticexperience....grief is so intense,that i think it's accepted even lessthan sadness....but if we could onlyidentify it, and allow ourselves towork through it, i believe we'd be such healthier people, physicallyand spiritually.unexpressed grief also can appear asphysical illness, which i believehas happened in my personal experience.we store it in our muscles and cellsand membranes, and it becomes a physicaldrain. my personality is naturallybouyant, so it doesn't remain long inmy consciousness.i'm still trying to recognize it andreconcile it in myself, but this isproving rather difficult....i don'tknow how! i'm trying to find informationon relating to grief in a spiritual way,but haven't found much.so i thank you all again for sharing... love and blessings, Hedgewitch------------------feel the religion withinGemini NymphGrief is a big part of my life. It is something that I feel our society doesn't understand well and lacks the necessary compassion towards. Grief is too often treated as a private matter that is not to be discussed in polite conversation. The result is that people who grieve feel isolated, or they feel that they must put their grief aside before they are ready and get back with the flow. While things like love, loss, and death are mysterious, I don't think there's anything that mysterious about grief. We need grief because it allows us to make necessarily transistions in our life by transforming us and deeping our awareness of our intimate connection with those people or things we have lost. Grief is simply a confrontation of ourselves and how we relate to others and things outside ourselves. As te cliche says "You never know what you have until its gone" fits the grief process well - grief teaches us just how significant someone or something has been to us in ways we were not able to knwo before the loss.I have never gone through the grieving process without being transformed. I think that is also another reason people often resist it - they fear that change. Loss and death asre such powerful agents in our lives that to allow them to change us against our own desires and will often leaves us feeling extremely powerless. But surrendering to what you cannot control in part of that transformation. I find that grief doesn't "resolve" the loss, so much as transform one into a being that can cope with it. Grief does make me feel "worn" and "warred" at times, as there's nothing easy about it, but yet healthy grieving has also always made me feel stronger, more enlightened and most importantly, more capable of loving deeply and in a genuine, pure way. I mean, how much purer can your love be if you love someone who is longer here for you to gain something from? Someone you love simply because you have known them and known their truth and beauty? CS Lewis once said of grief: "The grief now is the love then." To me that means that grief doesn't indicate an end of the love, simply the process through which we are able to continue in this life while loving someone or something that is no longer present to us. Ultimately grief teaches us about what it means to love and how profound and transcendant love truly is. sue g .......lovely words girl......profound and moving.... Hedgewitchdear Gemini Nymph ~thank you so much for that explanation!that helps me understand the natureof grief so much more. quote:We need grief because it allows us to make necessarily transistions in our life by transforming us and deeping our awareness of our intimate connection with those people or things we have lost. Grief is simply a confrontation of ourselves and how we relate to others and things outside ourselves.what you said about its transformative nature, and being a component of love,informed my understanding of grief so well.thank you so much for sharing this here. i love this ~ quote:Ultimately grief teaches us about what it means to love and how profound and transcendant love truly is. love and blessings, HedgewitchHedgewitchhi again there was a time that i had considereddoing a 'rebirthing'. does anyonehave any experience with this?i'm wondering if this would facilitatethe grieving process.ms. sue ~you seem to have an intimate knowledgeof grief and its function in your life....that's cool how you've integrated it intoyour being. can you perhaps suggest a flower essencefor helping with feeling and processinggrief?also, as an aside, can you suggest a floweressence, or combination, for cultivatingpatience with a wee child?his 3 yr old ways are becoming more andmore precocious, while my mama instinctsare recognizing a need to give more timeand attention to myself and my needs.i need to honor myself, but i need tomaintain a strong connection with him,and above all, cultivate more lovingpatience, which seems to elude me somethese days...(as a matter of factat this very moment....lol...)i've read that when a child takes anessence combination that the rest of the family should take it also...is thatsomething i should consider, do you think?thanks so much...love, Hedgewitch------------------feel the religion withinBlueTopaz124I also seem to have been born with an underlying sadness, even as a child was boisterous and full of energy, but also deeply sad and feeling, empathetic towards others' own suffering...knowing what they were feeling and able to feel their own pain as well as my own. I am no stranger to grief, having lost a mother and infant son, other family members and loves that I have loved deeply.Such wise and moving words here by everyone and I hope Hedgewitch that you can move through and with the process of grief. I also tend to agree that society can almost suppress grief, our lifestyle almost doesn't allow us to go through something so necessary, having to 'get on with things' after a loss or change. Knowing that loss and change are a natural part of life may help cope with these losses a bit. hugs,Laurasue gHi HedgewitchI found the homeopathic remedy ignatia excellent for grief, and I use the Back Flower remedies every day.....I use Oak, and I hear hornbeam is very good when you are exhausted and pushed and of course imaptiens for giving us patients (are you an Aries...as the impatiens is good for mars energy. You can take up to five remedies a day....just put a few drops of each in a dropper bottle and mix with spring water and then take as needed. I try and take every 3 or 4 hours.There is another one called mustard, but that is more for depression, the black cloud, I suppose that would treat grief too.Yes I have been told that you can give children the same remedies as the mother, for example the impatiens if he/she is that way....or for fear Aspen....Rock Rose for nightmares, Walnut for change. Hedge, if you go into google and type bach flower remedies, they will give you a list of the symptoms and which remedies help.Please ask, if there is anything I can do to help.....its hard work girl isnt it mothering.....our son is almost 7 and I am left exhausted most of the time. I was 47 yesterday and feel having him at 40 has taken its toll on my body....but I still have that devilment and sense of fun...thanks be to God.... BlueTopaz.So sorry to read your words....if I can help at all, please ask. Well done for being so brave and open..its a huge part of the healing path isnt it girl...God bless you.. loveSue xxxsue gJust found this link which is helpful in connection with the remedies www.bachflower.com good luckxxxHedgewitchsweet sue ~thank you so much for youranswer here....i have all those essencesand will try mixing up a good combination.i'll take a look at that link too...i have some excellent books onthe essences, but i thought it wouldbe nice to have the personal touchof an expert, as i don't havethat much experience with them...i will try that homeopathic remedy too....hoping to use more homeopathy in the future.love and light to you dear lady Hedgewitch------------------feel the religion withinsue gGood luck with them Hedgewitch......I have just mixed hornbeam, oak and aspen in a bottle together and am gonna try and remember to use them every day.I give our son Rock Rose, mixed with walnut and aspen too.Hope they help....I understand the stresses of parenthood...am feeling very pushed at the moment with this.. love to you Sue xxxxsalomesue ~ i've been looking into some of thedeeper properties of the essences...one i'm delighted with ~ rock water...not from a flower at all,but water that flows over rocks...it allows life to flow more freely througha person, opening up the heart to thejoy that's always available,all around us, inherent in the beautyof life, if we but open our eyes to see. i'll often let my boy pick an essence he wants, let his intuition guide him to theappropriate one. he seems to know wellwhich he needs too, and at times he refusesto take any at all, although he really likesthem. his little heart knows. love to you from salome salomeThe Gifts of GriefOct. 28, 2005by StarhawkI woke up this morning thinking about grief. It’s almost Halloween, the time of year when, we say, the veil is thin between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Here in San Francisco, we’re preparing for our big, public, Spiral Dance ritual on Saturday night, busy getting all the last-minute details taken care of, dealing with the complexities of a new location and a new form for the ritual. It’s easy to get caught up in the responsibilities and the practicalities…but this morning, in that twilight space between waking and sleeping, I found myself thinking of the dead.There are so many dead this year. So many large scale tragedies. The great wave last winter that swept tens of thousands to their death in Asia. The hurricanes and floods in the Gulf Coast and the Caribbean. The earthquake in Pakistan, the mudslides in Guatemala, the simmering volcanoes in El Salvador. Natural disasters—compounded by official neglect, intensified by global warming and the destruction of wetlands and mangrove swamps and all of nature’s protective systems.And the dead of war. Two thousand American soldiers, tens of thousands of Iraquis. A constant attrition of Palestinians and Israelis. The countless war dead of Africa who have dropped out of the news. Each death a loss to someone, a huge well of grief.My mother, who died thirteen years ago, was an expert on loss and grief. A psychotherapist, she wrote a book, “A Time to Grieve”, which is still a classic in the field of bereavement. She taught me that grief is not something to fear. If we let ourselves feel our pain and loss, if we truly mourn and rage, grief has a healing, transformative power.Cindy Sheehan, the mother of one of those dead soldiers, is taking her grief to the gates of the White House, chaining herself to the fence like the suffragists who demanded votes for women, long ago. I met her earlier this year, at Crawford, Texas, where she encamped before Bush’s ranch demanding to meet him face to face, to confront him with the reality of her loss, to ask him what was the noble cause her son died for. Her vigil there was like the small waves of the sea, eating away at the buttresses of his power, a harbinger of the storm surge to come.If compassion is the ability to feel and imagine someone else’s grief, Bush and his cabal of ultra-right advisors have long seemed lacking. Moreover, they have fed on death, used death and fear and horror to buttress their power. They used the deaths of September 11 to extend their power. They used fear and ruthlessness to stun their opposition into silence and complicity as they unleashed a brutal and criminal war. Like vampires, they have maintained their unnatural life with blood.But the counter to this ghoulish power is real grief, real loss. True grief has the power to open the heart. It strips away lies, dissolves false differences, and reminds us that we are all vulnerable, all mortal, all clinging for our lives to those fragile cords of love that bind us to those we care about. True grief casts out fear.“There’s nothing they can do to me,” Cindy Sheehan said to me at Camp Casey. “There’s nothing more than can take from me. I’ve already lost my son.”Standing among the pictures of the dead, at Camp Casey, I imagined the spirits of those soldiers rising up, a tidal wave of rage and anguish turning against those who caused and misuse their deaths. I see Cindy, fearless in her grief, strong in her mother-right, bringing that spectral army to the gates of the White House itself. I see them enter in, cleansing, rooting out lies, overturning every false foundation. I feel a fresh wind blowing, awakening courage, integrity, and compassion in all of our hearts.This is the spell I would shape this Samhain season. We are in a time of great loss, facing more before the world comes back into balance. The gifts of grief are painful, but if we open to them, allow our hearts to break and in breaking, expand, then grief and compassion may save our lives. http://www.starhawk.org/activism/activism-writings/gifts_of_grief.html
why does it seem so minimized in this culture?
how should one work through it ina healthy, cathartic way?
i'm baffled by the concept of grief,and its mechanism. earlier this yeari was in need of chiropractic care forsome injuries, and the chiropractorquestioned me about some personal things.
as i began to tell her, a string of relatedevents rose to the surface, and i wentinto emotional meltdown.
she was shocked, and said that i hadnumerous experiences hidden away inside,and that i seriously needed to allowmyself to grieve for many of these incidences.
i was so surprised to hear that....i had never considered the grieving processa necessary component in my life. shesuggested talking to someone who couldhelp me unlock the grief i held inside,and allow my self the grieving i needed.
i didn't contact anyone about facilitatingthis, but the thought has stayed with me,and i continue to ponder, at times, theidea of grief, what it is, and how to allow it to operate successfully in one'slife...
i'm surprised to find how little i reallyunderstand it....and how little exposureit has in our world.
the grieving process ~
does anyone know about grief, and how itmanifests in our lives, for healingor otherwise?
i'm beginning to believe it's a strongnecessity, that we neglect all too often.
loving kindness to all who yearn,Hedgewitch
I know a few things about grief. I know enough to know that like love, it is highly personal and defined only by she who grieves.
I am sorry if this answer seems flip; that's not my intention.
I will ponder this and see if I can find a better answer for you. However, I suspect in the Yin and Yang of life it is simply another experience for us.
------------------The less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine. -Indigo Girls
Mmmmm....I came into this life grieving....didnt understand it until very recently...I brough in trauma and sadness from another existence......it confounded me at times...went against the lightness and joy of my personality..tis only now I understand the need to do it....
That is why I cry at lot...and wail (not of late), but I would go out look up into the heavens and scream...and not know why....
...but I do now....and it feels good.....
love to all
Sue G xxxx
Every time someone "lets me down" I allow myself to grieve....I may only have known this person a short while, but even so it triggers "past" memory and evokes a similar feeling......I allow the hurt to surface....
Everytime someone "stabs me in the back" because of their inadequacy, as well as dealing with it by saying "its their problem , their low self esteem"......I also allow myself to grieve....
Eveytime I do this......I become a stronger person because I have allowed myself to feel so deeply and release that.....I also become healthier and happier....
Every time Ive tried to supress a feeling, I have become angry, depressed and then physically ill.....
So I suppose in short grieving is necesary for good health and a happy and free mind........
love
Sue xxx
i'm just confounded by it, becausei never encountered the concept atall growing up, and in my adultyears, moving at an ever fasterpace, there was no time foracknowledging or understanding grief.
especially as something separate andquite different from depression....which i tend to dismiss in my ownlife, as for me, i think it's misusedas a manipulative label. there'sabsolutely nothing wrong with feelingsad, about events, or people....oranything, in fact i think it's ratherhealthy to allow oneself to experiencesadness....but it seems that in thisculture, feelings are maniputlated forcontrol purposes, thus being sad is turnedinto an illness.....
i do agree that depression can be a real phenomenon, but that if wewould allow our feelings more reignit might not manifest in the firstplace.
but the idea of grief extends beyondsadness....as something that's anecessary component to a traumaticexperience....grief is so intense,that i think it's accepted even lessthan sadness....but if we could onlyidentify it, and allow ourselves towork through it, i believe we'd be such healthier people, physicallyand spiritually.
unexpressed grief also can appear asphysical illness, which i believehas happened in my personal experience.we store it in our muscles and cellsand membranes, and it becomes a physicaldrain. my personality is naturallybouyant, so it doesn't remain long inmy consciousness.
i'm still trying to recognize it andreconcile it in myself, but this isproving rather difficult....i don'tknow how! i'm trying to find informationon relating to grief in a spiritual way,but haven't found much.
so i thank you all again for sharing...
love and blessings, Hedgewitch
------------------feel the religion within
While things like love, loss, and death are mysterious, I don't think there's anything that mysterious about grief. We need grief because it allows us to make necessarily transistions in our life by transforming us and deeping our awareness of our intimate connection with those people or things we have lost. Grief is simply a confrontation of ourselves and how we relate to others and things outside ourselves. As te cliche says "You never know what you have until its gone" fits the grief process well - grief teaches us just how significant someone or something has been to us in ways we were not able to knwo before the loss.
I have never gone through the grieving process without being transformed. I think that is also another reason people often resist it - they fear that change. Loss and death asre such powerful agents in our lives that to allow them to change us against our own desires and will often leaves us feeling extremely powerless. But surrendering to what you cannot control in part of that transformation.
I find that grief doesn't "resolve" the loss, so much as transform one into a being that can cope with it. Grief does make me feel "worn" and "warred" at times, as there's nothing easy about it, but yet healthy grieving has also always made me feel stronger, more enlightened and most importantly, more capable of loving deeply and in a genuine, pure way. I mean, how much purer can your love be if you love someone who is longer here for you to gain something from? Someone you love simply because you have known them and known their truth and beauty?
CS Lewis once said of grief: "The grief now is the love then." To me that means that grief doesn't indicate an end of the love, simply the process through which we are able to continue in this life while loving someone or something that is no longer present to us. Ultimately grief teaches us about what it means to love and how profound and transcendant love truly is.
thank you so much for that explanation!that helps me understand the natureof grief so much more.
quote:We need grief because it allows us to make necessarily transistions in our life by transforming us and deeping our awareness of our intimate connection with those people or things we have lost. Grief is simply a confrontation of ourselves and how we relate to others and things outside ourselves.
what you said about its transformative nature, and being a component of love,informed my understanding of grief so well.
thank you so much for sharing this here.
i love this ~
quote:Ultimately grief teaches us about what it means to love and how profound and transcendant love truly is.
there was a time that i had considereddoing a 'rebirthing'. does anyonehave any experience with this?i'm wondering if this would facilitatethe grieving process.
ms. sue ~
you seem to have an intimate knowledgeof grief and its function in your life....that's cool how you've integrated it intoyour being.
can you perhaps suggest a flower essencefor helping with feeling and processinggrief?
also, as an aside, can you suggest a floweressence, or combination, for cultivatingpatience with a wee child?his 3 yr old ways are becoming more andmore precocious, while my mama instinctsare recognizing a need to give more timeand attention to myself and my needs.
i need to honor myself, but i need tomaintain a strong connection with him,and above all, cultivate more lovingpatience, which seems to elude me somethese days...(as a matter of factat this very moment....lol...)
i've read that when a child takes anessence combination that the rest of the family should take it also...is thatsomething i should consider, do you think?
thanks so much...
love, Hedgewitch
Such wise and moving words here by everyone and I hope Hedgewitch that you can move through and with the process of grief. I also tend to agree that society can almost suppress grief, our lifestyle almost doesn't allow us to go through something so necessary, having to 'get on with things' after a loss or change. Knowing that loss and change are a natural part of life may help cope with these losses a bit.
hugs,Laura
I found the homeopathic remedy ignatia excellent for grief, and I use the Back Flower remedies every day.....I use Oak, and I hear hornbeam is very good when you are exhausted and pushed and of course imaptiens for giving us patients (are you an Aries...as the impatiens is good for mars energy. You can take up to five remedies a day....just put a few drops of each in a dropper bottle and mix with spring water and then take as needed. I try and take every 3 or 4 hours.
There is another one called mustard, but that is more for depression, the black cloud, I suppose that would treat grief too.
Yes I have been told that you can give children the same remedies as the mother, for example the impatiens if he/she is that way....or for fear Aspen....Rock Rose for nightmares, Walnut for change. Hedge, if you go into google and type bach flower remedies, they will give you a list of the symptoms and which remedies help.
Please ask, if there is anything I can do to help.....its hard work girl isnt it mothering.....our son is almost 7 and I am left exhausted most of the time. I was 47 yesterday and feel having him at 40 has taken its toll on my body....but I still have that devilment and sense of fun...thanks be to God....
BlueTopaz.
So sorry to read your words....if I can help at all, please ask. Well done for being so brave and open..its a huge part of the healing path isnt it girl...God bless you..
Sue
xxx
good luck
thank you so much for youranswer here....i have all those essencesand will try mixing up a good combination.
i'll take a look at that link too...i have some excellent books onthe essences, but i thought it wouldbe nice to have the personal touchof an expert, as i don't havethat much experience with them...
i will try that homeopathic remedy too....hoping to use more homeopathy in the future.
love and light to you dear lady
Hedgewitch
I give our son Rock Rose, mixed with walnut and aspen too.
Hope they help....I understand the stresses of parenthood...am feeling very pushed at the moment with this..
love to you
Sue xxxx
i've been looking into some of thedeeper properties of the essences...
one i'm delighted with ~ rock water...not from a flower at all,but water that flows over rocks...
it allows life to flow more freely througha person, opening up the heart to thejoy that's always available,all around us, inherent in the beautyof life, if we but open our eyes to see.
i'll often let my boy pick an essence he wants, let his intuition guide him to theappropriate one. he seems to know wellwhich he needs too, and at times he refusesto take any at all, although he really likesthem. his little heart knows.
love to you from salome
I woke up this morning thinking about grief. It’s almost Halloween, the time of year when, we say, the veil is thin between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Here in San Francisco, we’re preparing for our big, public, Spiral Dance ritual on Saturday night, busy getting all the last-minute details taken care of, dealing with the complexities of a new location and a new form for the ritual. It’s easy to get caught up in the responsibilities and the practicalities…but this morning, in that twilight space between waking and sleeping, I found myself thinking of the dead.
There are so many dead this year. So many large scale tragedies. The great wave last winter that swept tens of thousands to their death in Asia. The hurricanes and floods in the Gulf Coast and the Caribbean. The earthquake in Pakistan, the mudslides in Guatemala, the simmering volcanoes in El Salvador. Natural disasters—compounded by official neglect, intensified by global warming and the destruction of wetlands and mangrove swamps and all of nature’s protective systems.
And the dead of war. Two thousand American soldiers, tens of thousands of Iraquis. A constant attrition of Palestinians and Israelis. The countless war dead of Africa who have dropped out of the news. Each death a loss to someone, a huge well of grief.
My mother, who died thirteen years ago, was an expert on loss and grief. A psychotherapist, she wrote a book, “A Time to Grieve”, which is still a classic in the field of bereavement. She taught me that grief is not something to fear. If we let ourselves feel our pain and loss, if we truly mourn and rage, grief has a healing, transformative power.
Cindy Sheehan, the mother of one of those dead soldiers, is taking her grief to the gates of the White House, chaining herself to the fence like the suffragists who demanded votes for women, long ago. I met her earlier this year, at Crawford, Texas, where she encamped before Bush’s ranch demanding to meet him face to face, to confront him with the reality of her loss, to ask him what was the noble cause her son died for. Her vigil there was like the small waves of the sea, eating away at the buttresses of his power, a harbinger of the storm surge to come.
If compassion is the ability to feel and imagine someone else’s grief, Bush and his cabal of ultra-right advisors have long seemed lacking. Moreover, they have fed on death, used death and fear and horror to buttress their power. They used the deaths of September 11 to extend their power. They used fear and ruthlessness to stun their opposition into silence and complicity as they unleashed a brutal and criminal war. Like vampires, they have maintained their unnatural life with blood.
But the counter to this ghoulish power is real grief, real loss. True grief has the power to open the heart. It strips away lies, dissolves false differences, and reminds us that we are all vulnerable, all mortal, all clinging for our lives to those fragile cords of love that bind us to those we care about. True grief casts out fear.
“There’s nothing they can do to me,” Cindy Sheehan said to me at Camp Casey. “There’s nothing more than can take from me. I’ve already lost my son.”
Standing among the pictures of the dead, at Camp Casey, I imagined the spirits of those soldiers rising up, a tidal wave of rage and anguish turning against those who caused and misuse their deaths. I see Cindy, fearless in her grief, strong in her mother-right, bringing that spectral army to the gates of the White House itself. I see them enter in, cleansing, rooting out lies, overturning every false foundation. I feel a fresh wind blowing, awakening courage, integrity, and compassion in all of our hearts.
This is the spell I would shape this Samhain season. We are in a time of great loss, facing more before the world comes back into balance. The gifts of grief are painful, but if we open to them, allow our hearts to break and in breaking, expand, then grief and compassion may save our lives.
http://www.starhawk.org/activism/activism-writings/gifts_of_grief.html
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