Day 75: Where and how does your grief show up?
One potential maddening (or at least perplexing) question I ask folks is where does their grief show up in their body? And then I go further—if that grief had a color or shape or movement or could even be visualized as some object or figure, what would it be?
The reality is that the answer doesn’t ultimately matter. The mattering is in the person observing their grief in this way, and then building a relationship between themselves and this manifestation of grief.
Some give their grief a name. Some notice how the grief arrives as a heavy cloak and then has changed into a sheer, flowing cape they never will take off. Some have spoken of their grief as housed in their skeletal structure, and then when cared for and acknowledged, found a home elsewhere in their body.
Externalization and being able to observe our own grief can be an odd, yet huge part of a healing journey. It provides a moment of unblending, a moment of oscillation, all the while asking ourselves to look our pain straight in the eye, hopefully with some curiosity and compassion. This is an act of turning towards ourselves, noticing our own pain, and this has the power to transform our experience. This is the ultimate form of self-compassion…to be able to show up for the most painful elements of ourselves.
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