Grief Is A Portal
Reflections on grief's medicine, allowing it in, and allowing it to transform us.
Grief is a portal.
Grief is a way into the depth of life.
Grief is a way into dying so that you may live again, only this time, with a stronger connection to the thread that weaves you into this reality.
Grief is like the ocean. Grief is like water.
It comes in waves that sometimes swallow you whole, and if you let go just enough, you are left ashore, renewed and reborn.
Grief is an elder who comes and insists on the radical transformation of your very being.
Grief can only pass through if you welcome it in, speak with it, and come to know it without trying to deny its entry. Otherwise, it settles in and waits until you’re ready to speak.
As the great teacher Martin Prechtel says, “grief is praise.”
It is proof of just how deeply we have loved. The proof of just how holy what we carry inside is, and it is that which brings beauty back into life…if we let it.
Without it, where would that poem be? That song, that book, that artwork?
Without it, where would our greatest guides be? Without their having had to pass through the womb of the Great Mother’s wrath.
I’ve decided to get curious about this strange friend. I’ve decided that instead of resisting her call, I am going to allow myself to feel her waters.
I’ve decided that maybe, just maybe, these great acts from the Divine which bring us to our knees, are ways to bring us ever closer to the Divine’s embrace. To bring us closer to the humility it takes to truly surrender ourselves to, not what we want for ourselves, but rather what Divinity wants for us.
And in that trust, in that decision, while you begin to know in your bones you are held, you are also allowed to feel the sadness of letting go. And to be completely changed by it.
Be sure not to retract in the face of this divine visitor, for I promise, it seeks for you to lift your heart, ever higher towards the heart of the Sky, to bow down, ever humbler, to the heart of the Earth.
Some beautiful beings who have been inspiring and nourishing me lately:
Martin Prechtel - specifically “The Smell of Rain On Dust”
It's so good to read you again love 🤍🌿