GRIEF SUPPORT:
“Crazy Good Grief,” is what author Paula Stephens calls it, who wrote the insightful book - From Grief to Growth. I know it sounds crazy, how could grief possibly be good?
Grief is an incredibly powerful emotion - it seems to have the uncanny ability to stop time in its tracks and bring us to our knees. In many ancient cultures, grievers are deeply honoured, supported and held by the community, as the grief process is viewed an an initiation. In North America many of us have grown up in grief and death phobic families and communities and this has led to a tremendous amount of unprocessed grief. The lack of supportive spaces to bring our grief has meant that it has often been passed down through the generations. Unprocessed grief can show up in our lives in many ways, including withdrawal and aggression, which can negatively impact our current relationships. Learning how to tend to your grief, no matter how big or small, is a radical act of love for yourself, family, community and our world.
Good Company: grief tending + community support group
Shuswap B.C.
“Life is a growth in the art of loss,” John O’Donohue
As human beings we love, so we also grieve. The challenge is, our dominant culture has sent us all kinds of unhelpful messages about what grief “should” look like, feel like, sound like and how long it should “last.” Most of these messages are simply untrue and can have harmful consequences. Frances Weller notes that unmetabolized grief often shows up in our lives as anger and aggression. It can keep us from being connected and current in our relationships with ourselves and others.
This group is about normalizing grief as part of living and loving well. It is a place to gather “ in good company” just as we are; to regularly tend the many threads of grief that we may feel as human beings at this current time. This may be loss of a loved one, pet, a part of self we have abandoned, a relationship, environment/habitat, community, ancestors and many more.
“Grief, experienced by every human, repeatedly and often compounded, must be metabolized. Involving every layer of our being, grief offers a powerful invitation to courageously embody and remember our most essential self and oneness with all of life. “ Amy Chadwick
By regularly meeting our grief with care, attention and community - balanced with a practice of gratitude/appreciation, we can start to embody our grief. This can lead to a fuller, more vibrant and authentic expression of ourselves in the world.
“Grief is subversive, undermining the quiet agreement to behave and be in control of our emotions. It is an act of protest that declares our refusal to live numb and small. There is something feral about grief, something essentially outside the ordained and sanctioned behaviors of our culture. Because of that, grief is necessary to the vitality of the soul. Contrary to our fears, grief is suffused with life-force.... It is not a state of deadness or emotional flatness. Grief is alive, wild, untamed and cannot be domesticated. It resists the demands to remain passive and still. We move in jangled, unsettled, and riotous ways when grief takes hold of us. It is truly an emotion that rises from the soul.”
Regular maintenance and tending is vital to things working well - grief is no different. If we don’t turn towards it, listen and respond - it can clog our system (body, mind, spirt) harden our hearts and prevent us from living our best lives.
Good Company is about:
normalizing and validating grief
Creating a collective space to do this in community where it is honoured and not shamed
Embodiment
Mindfulness
Deep listening
Sharing from our hearts
Pendulation and titration
Gratitude and appreciation
Choice
Creating a Trauma informed space
Wholistic approach: therapeutic art, movement, breath, sound and more
Ritual
Creative Expression
Education and de-mystifying grief
This group is by donation and will be held twice a month, the second and fourth Mondays from 7-8:30pm. (Unless otherwise specified)
The first six sessions will be:
April 8 and April 22
May 13 and May 27
June 10 and June 24
It will be held in the Wellness Room at Gratitude Yoga in downtown Salmon Arm - 185 Hudson Ave.
Please bring a nature item (something you find beauty in) journal, pen and water bottle. Wear comfortable clothing and most importantly come with curiosity and and open heart/mind. We welcome you just as you are, with all of our hearts.
if you plan to attend, we ask that you sign up with your email so that we can send you notes about specific items to bring for sessions
Your guides will be Cate Currie and Kylie Judge, who both have a background in creating supportive, trauma informed spaces. Combined , their training spans yoga, art, conscious movement, psychotherapy, meditation, sound, somatics, breathwork, ritual.
Register Here:
A mentor in Grief Tending, Francis Weller (you’ll hear me talk about him a lot!) says,
“When our grief cannot be spoken, it falls into the shadow and re-arises in us as symptoms. So many of us are depressed, anxious, and lonely. We struggle with addictions and find ourselves moving at a breathless pace, trying to keep up with the machinery of culture.”
Learning to companion our grief and keep it warm is vital, so that it can be integrated into our beings instead of frozen in our bodies creating an emotional backlog. In my experience, grief is not something that we get rid of, because grief is a direct result of loving and part of being human. We can experience grief in many forms; loss of a loved one, loss of dreams, disconnection from parts of ourselves, systemic/eco-grief, loss of connection to community, relationships and sense of belonging, and ancestral grief that has been passed down. Grief and grieving are the most human things and they are reflections of how deeply we let ourselves love and be-loved. Your grief deserves to be honoured.
“Grief and love are sisters, woven together from the beginning. Their kinship reminds us that there is no love that does not contain loss and no loss that is not a reminder of the love we carry for what we once held close.”
― Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief
So here is the good news, we CAN build our capacity for grieving, and offering ourselves a supportive, loving vessel for grief to be witnessed, felt and moved through. I believe that we CAN be transformed by our grief into the most authentic versions of ourselves. Grief has the power to illuminate what really matters and re-orient us to truth in our lives. We NEED to get better at being with grief so that we can re-claim our vitality and ultimately live healthier lives, connected to our hearts, relationships and souls’ purpose.
So, how do we do this ?
We must have safe enough spaces to bring our grief just as it is - raw and untamed….
“Grief is subversive, undermining the quiet agreement to behave and be in control of our emotions. It is an act of protest that declares our refusal to live numb and small. There is something feral about grief, something essentially outside the ordained and sanctioned behaviors of our culture. Because of that, grief is necessary to the vitality of the soul. Contrary to our fears, grief is suffused with life-force.... It is not a state of deadness or emotional flatness. Grief is alive, wild, untamed and cannot be domesticated. It resists the demands to remain passive and still. We move in jangled, unsettled, and riotous ways when grief takes hold of us. It is truly an emotion that rises from the soul.”
― Francis Weller
Our dominant culture in American has sent a message that grief is something we should relegate to the shadows, lock away and deal with on our own. However when grief is shared, it can actually bring us closer together as a human family, as we re-member this thread that unites and connects us. The truth is that we are NOT alone in our grief and culturally this a slowly starting to shift. We can undo the aloneness of grief by choosing to bring it to spaces where it will be witnessed, honoured and companioned – and Breath and Being is one of those spaces. We believe that grief is best held in connection and community, so we have a couple of options for you to explore.
1:1 Grief Counselling with Kylie Judge, RTC – If this resonates with you and you are interested in our in person or virtual counselling services please visit us here: www.kyliejudge.com to book a free consultation!
We offer periodic grief rituals both online and live, in community. To find out what opportunities are coming please email: hello@breathandbeing.ca
