Learning how the impacts of vast emotions affect us can be a rather difficult task. I have been dealing with the significance of the burden known as grief since the ripe age of 16. It is not something that neither goes away nor forgives being ignored. Trust me, I tried ignoring it for many years, and all that did was make it angry.
Grief, as I have defined it, is the loss of someone or something, the aftermath of the hurt, and the overwhelming negative emotions that will not go away no matter how hard you pray they will.
However, I have realized that being surrounded is a good way to quiet the rushing noise of it. Being with friends, people who love you and understand you, even a professor who you just have a connection with… these people are meant to crowd into your space and help you when you are drowning in negative feelings.
Although grief is such a heavy emotion, it is never impossible to grow because of it. In any way that matters to you, growth is possible at every corner.
With God, with friends and with loved ones by your side. If you have kept up with my editorials this semester, you know that my last editorial was about feeling lonely and how that’s OK. I want you to know that in no way do I believe that growth only comes from being in a community. Growth is something that people encounter at different rates and through various experiences in subjectivity. Grief, as I have unwillingly come to find out, needs both community and the utter silence of being on your own to help you grow.
I know that the overwhelming weight of heavy emotions like this can sometimes become too much to bear. I’ve been there. I understand the defeat that comes with it.
Being with yourself and others is essential in overcoming the feeling that you will never become reacquainted with a sense of stillness. I realize that this seems slightly contradictory in itself. Allow me to elaborate further:
Being alone in extreme sadness will only help you better understand how you deal with such emotions. It allows you to cry, grieve and come to terms with it on your own time, in your way. Being with other people while attempting to do the above will only help you understand that there is more to life than the ever-flowing river of despair that you might find yourself drowning in. People are there to help you, but you must first attempt to help yourself by feeling those things and allowing them to crash over you.
A relationship with God might not be on your priority list after you’ve had extreme loss punching you in the face. It wasn’t in mine for many years, and it still remains in the middle for me. I’m learning; I’m trying. And that’s all you can really ask for when you’re going through something you don’t understand.
Allow me to share a rather personal story. The first time I experienced grief, my relationship with Christ was strong and steadfast. I remember yelling— no, screaming— at God in anguish and agony the night I lost someone. I wondered, “Why would you do this?”
And once I understood why God might do something like that, grief hit me again with someone else. And I was back to kicking and screaming and crying and not understanding why, why, why something like this could happen to someone twice within a few years, not understanding how He could do those things to them.
A relationship with God will not bring your grief to an end, nor will it get those people back. It might help once I reach a spot where I can fully trust Him again. Until then, I know what makes me tick. I know what brings me peace when I feel like peace is not something achievable. I know what brings me joy when I feel like joy might not be in the cards. And I know that the people I’ve lost are healthy, and happy, watching me from above and guiding me in the right direction.
I hope that one day, when you experience loss so immense that you have no idea where to start the grieving process, you have people in your life to help guide and love you. And I hope that you love them back.
Grief is an ever-flowing river of growth
Learning how the impacts of vast emotions affect us can be a rather difficult task. I have been dealing with the significance of the burden known as grief since the ripe age of 16. It is not something that neither goes away nor forgives being ignored. Trust me, I tried ignoring it for many years, and all that did was make it angry.
Grief, as I have defined it, is the loss of someone or something, the aftermath of the hurt, and the overwhelming negative emotions that will not go away no matter how hard you pray they will.
However, I have realized that being surrounded is a good way to quiet the rushing noise of it. Being with friends, people who love you and understand you, even a professor who you just have a connection with… these people are meant to crowd into your space and help you when you are drowning in negative feelings.
Although grief is such a heavy emotion, it is never impossible to grow because of it. In any way that matters to you, growth is possible at every corner.
With God, with friends and with loved ones by your side. If you have kept up with my editorials this semester, you know that my last editorial was about feeling lonely and how that’s OK. I want you to know that in no way do I believe that growth only comes from being in a community. Growth is something that people encounter at different rates and through various experiences in subjectivity. Grief, as I have unwillingly come to find out, needs both community and the utter silence of being on your own to help you grow.
I know that the overwhelming weight of heavy emotions like this can sometimes become too much to bear. I’ve been there. I understand the defeat that comes with it.
Being with yourself and others is essential in overcoming the feeling that you will never become reacquainted with a sense of stillness. I realize that this seems slightly contradictory in itself. Allow me to elaborate further:
Being alone in extreme sadness will only help you better understand how you deal with such emotions. It allows you to cry, grieve and come to terms with it on your own time, in your way. Being with other people while attempting to do the above will only help you understand that there is more to life than the ever-flowing river of despair that you might find yourself drowning in. People are there to help you, but you must first attempt to help yourself by feeling those things and allowing them to crash over you.
A relationship with God might not be on your priority list after you’ve had extreme loss punching you in the face. It wasn’t in mine for many years, and it still remains in the middle for me. I’m learning; I’m trying. And that’s all you can really ask for when you’re going through something you don’t understand.
Allow me to share a rather personal story. The first time I experienced grief, my relationship with Christ was strong and steadfast. I remember yelling— no, screaming— at God in anguish and agony the night I lost someone. I wondered, “Why would you do this?”
And once I understood why God might do something like that, grief hit me again with someone else. And I was back to kicking and screaming and crying and not understanding why, why, why something like this could happen to someone twice within a few years, not understanding how He could do those things to them.
A relationship with God will not bring your grief to an end, nor will it get those people back. It might help once I reach a spot where I can fully trust Him again. Until then, I know what makes me tick. I know what brings me peace when I feel like peace is not something achievable. I know what brings me joy when I feel like joy might not be in the cards. And I know that the people I’ve lost are healthy, and happy, watching me from above and guiding me in the right direction.
I hope that one day, when you experience loss so immense that you have no idea where to start the grieving process, you have people in your life to help guide and love you. And I hope that you love them back.