30 Dec Cloaked in Grief
Cloaked in Grief.
A haunting and powerful psychological force. Invisible
I'm curious; it's one of my core values and I need to understand why I'm experiencing this feeling.
I understand why we love, why we hate, what moves us to anger.
I understand that vulnerability often brings with it pain. Yet, I can't shut myself off from what caused the pain.
I've never known grief.
Not ever. Until now.
But surely grief isn't simply a sense of loss? I've lost things before and they mattered not.
There are varying degrees and forms of grief.
One I discovered is the term "grief burst".
Aptly named, I've gone through this in the month since my soulmate passed.
The flood of feelings of grief that can be triggered suddenly and felt very intensely.
The "burst" seems to come out of nowhere, sometimes though, connected to a specific memory.
They say it will end. That time will heal. That it is a linear process.
Very convenient for some, but not for me.
If I can understand the feelings, I can better deal with them. My heart is broken but my mind needs to understand this feeling and how best to glue the pieces back into something less perfect than it was.
As psychologist and grief researcher Mary-Frances O'Connor put in her book "The Grieving Brain: The Surprising Science of How We Learn From Love and Loss.":
Grief is a heart-wrenchingly painful problem for the brain to solve and grieving necessitates learning to live in the world with the absence of someone you love deeply, who is ingrained in your understanding of the world."
That's getting to the heart of the matter. Everything we did, we did together. We were "ingrained" into each other.
My choices, particularly in the past decade or so, were based on which would bring most comfort and joy to my mate.
Whenever I offered Angela a choice, she turned it right around and wanted me to choose.
That's what happens when you get two people, both trying to please the one they love.
My understanding of the world was heavily influenced by my mate. The music, the food, the entertainment. Pretty much everything.
And it brought with it the blessing and curse of attachment.
Everything else in the world I easily could live without. As long as I had my mate.
Now she's no longer physically here, I am left with little alternative than to rebuild my life. Piece by broken piece.
If "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" is true, I will find strength in discovering new fields.
I have all the time in the world to put the pieces back together. It won't be perfect but it will have to suffice.
I'm exploring new avenues. At first, I defaulted to the old. Bouncing around, back & forth, like some loose pinball. In my case professional golf, but soon realised that it probably wasn't for me. In any shape or form.
A German Shepherd Rescue Dog for companionship. I realised that I couldn't commit enough to the idea, much as it appealed.
Science, religion, and one on which I've previously written back in 2019 - Stoicism.
A Greek philosophy that, too late, explicitly warns against the dangers of attachment.
In which everything should be treated as disposable because ultimately it will be disposed.
memento mori: everything must die.
That attachment, stoicism explains, leads to suffering.
Say that again!
But love is a pain I knowingly accepted. No matter what lies ahead, the pain has been and always will be a fair price for just one minute of pure love.
So goodbye to that part of stoicism. I'm confident that I will never love anything, anyone, or attach myself, this way again. Still attached, though, to who I had for the past fifty years, I will remain for all eternity.
I guess I'm looking for an idea, or a phrase that will ease the grief rather than take it from me.
The nearest I've come in the past month has been this:
"Life doesn't get easier or more forgiving. We get stronger and more resilient." - Steve Maraboli.
Stronger and more resilient - I can do that.
We fall, we break, we fail. But then we rise, we heal and we overcome.
The struggles of this time are developing the strength I need for tomorrow,
The light is flickering in this storm. Until it again shines bright.
Being strong is my only choice.
Strength of character. From the Greek meaning "I engrave". Character is something that is etched into us by our experiences.
Character is something I'm always harping on about. Over competence.
Everyone has it. For some it's stronger than in others.
So always meeting each new day with the aim of creating something better than the day before.
The strength to see me through these dark days.
Not ridding myself of the pain, but bearing it with more ease.
Thanks for reading.
chris@andsothestorybegan.co.uk
Mob: (44) 07369251435
Chris.
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