Learning As We Go - Growing in Unity Group

While I would rather that grief was not my writing companion at this moment, it is. But staying true to my inner convictions that everything that is confesses to the reality of Love as the All in all, I must see grief in that same light.

One thing that I have learned from all of this is that we tend to hurt to the degree that we let ourselves love and be loved. It's as if grief is a return on investment. I know that this isn't a super encouraging description when we have been taught that grief is an undesirable and inconvenient experience to have. But if Love is the Source of all Life, then grief has to be an attribute of Love. The challenge is remembering that.

This time last year, a friend of mine witnessed the accidental death of one of his best friends--someone who was like a brother to him. He tried to save his friend's life. But, he was not able to. Grief is his creative partner too. A practice that he used to work with the grief is called Maitri which consists of making friends with painful experiences. This is something I've been trying to do too.

What I have realized is that making friends with grief is loving grief and loving grief connects us to all of the things that brought about the events that led up to grief. All of the things. So as I was witnessing all of the things and trying to stay in Love, I asked myself, "what do I do with all of this?" But, when I sat with it, I realized that this isn't the right question. The better question is "who would love have me be in this moment?"

One of the things about grief is how the "hard feelings" sneak up--the ones that make other people uncomfortable and remind us that we too are vulnerable to the persistent partnership with grief. There have been several times over the past two weeks when a single word or trying to tell a story knocked my feet out from under me. Then, I would try to figure out what to do. But, I have noticed that when I am in wonder not about what to do but rather about who love is calling me to be, even the "hard feelings" take me back to Love. Love is the question and the answer somehow.

In the Grief Is a Spiritual Practice little booklet here at CSC, Rev. Ogun Holder invites readers to surrender to the feelings (pg 31). He says that there is never a time when we are not whole. "We are never broken, even though we might feel we are." He then goes on to say that healing is making peace with what is and ceasing struggling against the current experience, releasing any desire that the loss never happened.

When I remember that Love is the Truth, who love has me be from moment to moment is always perfect even if it means balling up on the couch and letting my kids see me cry or allowing myself to laugh when I tell stories about my brother's shenanigans. Love holds it all and it hold me. And when I am who love has me be--when we are who love has us be--we remember that as Julian of Norwich taught, "All shall be well."