I was reminded  after class today of the importance of proper grieving by one of my yoga students. We were chatting about his dad’s immanent death and the bitter-sweet process that he and his whole family have been in of letting go.
Earlier this year, when Daniel went to his mother’s funeral in the U.S., I went through my own private grieving at home. Grief for my mother-in-law but also for losses within my own family.
Death unleashes the most powerful emotions, if we let it. And, if we don’t, residual emotions may sneak up on us years after the passing of loved ones.
Humans are quite amazing. Strong feelings may surface, not only in relation to loss of loved ones, but also to do with mourning for past youth, or innocence, or losing one’s work identity. It’s part of what makes one’s life richly-coloured, to be in touch with life’s ephemerality, watching it play out against the background of death.
My yoga student’s strong feelings have unleashed even more of his creative energy and he is applying it to the writing of a children’s book, where story is based on the transiency of seasons. We see the life-death cycle daily in Nature and it can be poignant and beautiful when we pay attention to it.
Today’s post title comes via therapist Aurora Hammond’s excellent book: Good Grief: the healing heart- a manual for the bereaved.

Going, Going.....