What is grief?

I attended an online writing seminar today via zoom, and through the wonders of technology I will never understand, I was virtually connected with eight other humans that I otherwise may never have crossed paths with, and will likely never interact with again. Yet there we sat in our various places – me at the writing desk in my room, recently gifted to me by my thoughtful husband; others in offices and living rooms and at kitchen tables, gathered to engage the topic of Writing to Heal.

Led by John DeDakis, a man with a lot of experience with both grief and writing, we were led through various writing prompts and exercises throughout the course, after each having the chance to introduce ourselves and share why we chose to attend.

I had taken a previous class that John had offered a while back, which was focused on writing a novel. When I explained at that time that I was trying my hand at writing a novel and grief was the major theme, and I was grieving the loss of someone very close to me as I was writing, he said he would keep me posted when he offered another class on Writing to Heal , and true to his word, more than a year later, he did.

I didn’t know what to expect from the course today. But I gained insight and inspiration, and for the window of time we were together, I found community in the eclectic mix of participants that were willing to share their hurts, hopes and insights.

One of the writing prompts we were asked to do was to answer the question: “What is grief?”

We were given ten minutes.

In my typical fashion, because it was time to sit down and write, I had to do a few quick things first. Grab some water. Plug in my phone. Get a different pencil. I don’t understand it but I have such a hard time making myself settle in when I get little moments of time to do what I so desire … to write.

Perhaps some of it has to do with fear – another theme we focused on as we talked about grief and writing. Maybe I am afraid that I’m not as good at this as I desperately want to be; that this “dream” of mine to be a writer is just an inflated sense of confidence produced by really nice people in my life telling me that I should keep writing. That I have a gift.

Maybe its connected to my internal struggle of confusing confidence with conceit. My “who am I?” complex that wonders what on earth I might have to offer when there are so many others that are better, wittier, more eloquent writers. My fear of wasting the time of others, feeling like maybe I have nothing new to say.

What I do know is that when I had eight minutes left, I got to work. This is what I wrote:

Grief is mysterious. It is inevitable and is woven into the fabric of our lives without our permission and despite our best efforts. It is within us and around us and demands our attention, sometimes at the most inopportune times; sometimes it lurks in the background.

Sometimes we are allowed to laugh and love and live in ways that we thought might never again be possible. Sometimes we are reduced to tears and “what if’s,” melancholy songs, and loneliness that hurts and yet feels necessary in the moment.

Grief is both universal and intensely personal. It can be shared by the masses and it can be carried alone. Grief changes us and is perhaps one of the most profound human experiences.

It asks us who will we become in spite of this loss? Will the weight of it crush us, or perhaps inspire us to build muscle we didn’t know we were capable of? Though the exercise of it hurts, in time we may find a strength in ourselves that we couldn’t have known existed were it not for the grief.

When we were asked if anyone would be willing to share what we had written, I shyly raised a hand and quickly put it down, not sure anyone had noticed. John saw me and teased about my half-hearted offer to share. So I read my response though it felt a bit beyond my comfort zone. When I finished, I saw nodding heads and smiling faces looking back at me from my computer screen. And John, the published author, said it sounded like a blog post and said he was happy I had shared.

So here it is. My first attempt to blog in quite a while. My hope is to start writing more frequently. For those of you reading, I appreciate your time and I hope my words bring some sort of good energy into your life.