My husband and I sat down to watch Netflix. Last Tuesday, our kids were finally in bed and we were having a chance to connect and talk about how we are feeling about all the things that are happening in our world, and in our personal life. We live in Massachusetts. The schools closed on Thursday March 12, 2020. As everything was happening I was feeling fearful, worried. I couldn’t get my mind around what was going on. I worried about my kids, and wanting to make sure they were safe. I worried about my parents and their well-being. I worried. Plain and simple I was laced in anxiety. I tried my best to keep myself busy and distracted. But my body kept holding the fear. And I got tired from it…
How have you been?
Days went by, and on this particular Tuesday night that my husband and I were talking we expressed how life felt completely unhinged, upside-down. He asked, “Are you still feeling fear?” And I said, “Not as much, I think I’m just really sad. But it’s more than sadness. I think what we are feeling is GRIEF.” And he said, “Yes, I think you are right.” Grief, hu? Yes, grief. Today my 10 year old son asked me why he feels this weird feeling inside himself? And I asked him to tell me about it. Then I said, “You are feeling grief.” We talked about how we felt when our Dog died unexpectedly from a heart attack this past summer. He said, “Well, it’s not exactly like that kind of hurt.” And I shared, well no it’s not. We loved him. That’s a different kind of grief. But what we felt then is still a bit like what we are feeling now. We are feeling an unxpected loss. We have lost what “feeling normal,” feels like. We miss our friends, our activities, our freedom to go about our town, and to travel and look forward to things. We miss the life that we used to have. I imagine we all do. In fact, if you are feeling grief, it might not just be coming from within you. It is also coming from the vibration of the world. Because we are all interconnected, we all feel each other’s grief; the world’s vibration carries grief right now. And since most of us have more time to sit and reflect and be aware of our thoughts our bodies are actually telling us what we are feeling and holding inside ourselves. So we notice our feelings even more.
How are you doing?
So now what? How do you tend to your grief? You recognize and give yourself permission to feel this grief; you feel the sadness, fear, discomfort, etc. Don’t dismiss it. You do what you need to do to love yourself through this. Imagine what you’d do for a grieving family member or best friend. And do this same thing for yourself. Offer yourself compassion: “It’s okay to be feeling this.” I’ve been sitting with my grief these days. And working at tending to myself. I find that writing has been a place for me to release some of the sadness I feel. Writing this post is helping me right now. It gives me a place to feel connected. All of us being here together is healing. I imagine many of you are finding ways to release your feelings too. If not, do something out of the ordinary for yourself and be creative. If you can, go outside and listen to birds singing or notice something you haven’t before.
What are you doing to tend to yourself?
Be gentle with yourself. Know that it is okay to feel what you do. It is okay to grieve. It is okay to be you. You are created with divine design. You are formed from LOVE.
And as you go about your day. Offer yourself love. Offer someone you care for some love. And let your love heal you, and as you do this your love will help change the vibration of the world…
And you will begin to heal. We will all begin to heal together.
Blessings of healing and kindness upon you, Erin
©️2012-2020. Erin Keane. Bella Bleue. All rights reserved. No portion of any post or photo may be copied or reproduced without prior written permission from the author, Erin Keane. Find me on Instagram @Erins_blessings and at Facebook Bella Bleue Healing by Erin Keane
Author’s Note:
***We all have different reactions of how to handle what we are feeling. And my professional experience as a hospital Chaplain, has taught me each of us grieve differently. So we each have to work at accepting our friends and family with love and being supportive to each other as we are grieving. Even if the way you grieve is different from your partner’s, parent’s, friend’s etc. way of grieving. We all need each other right now. So supporting one another is deeply important to our healing.
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