Grief. Loneliness.

The Shadow Heart

 

Shadow workers….

 

Not sexy…But here for something, right?

 

One of my favourite things about those ‘ray of sunshine’ type people is that if they are doing the inner work- they also know palpably the taste of pain and discomfort.

 

Some ‘sunshine people’ choose to project their misery out, manipulating, bullying, or being angry to others whilst they pass through their down spiral time. 

 

Others collapse inwards like a red dwarf in its final swoon before becoming a super massive black hole.

 

I’m kind of glad I’m the latter of the two, albeit uncomfortable to fold from the inside and flop down onto the ground for prayer. At least I’m not hurting anyone else when I’m in a suffering period.

 

Grief. Loneliness. 

Two unsexy and uncomfortable truths that I feel all humans share in their life paths.

 

 

Both seem to eat away and weigh so heavy on the heart they can be tempting to numb out from, dissociate from,  or try to escape. Perhaps because they are so inconclusive and sticky. 

 

 

As humans many of us love to SOLVE, to fix, to MAKE BETTER. Particularly us people pleaser types, who always wanted to keep the family unit happy.

 

Grief in particular is not solvable. 

 

Loneliness perhaps less so.  I’ve personally witnessed its diminishment during moments where we’re in circle shares and being seen. 

 

The power of community seems to lighten the load. 

 

Grief seems to span the wide expanse of time.  All encompassing, engulfing, and aching when it rides its oppressive head. And when it’s not there I guess we put it in a box until it’s time for another wave to come and take us, when we’re least expecting it. 

 

I often smirk at my surname ‘Greaves’, same pronunciation as ‘Grieves’  and wonder how much of my soul’s incarnation in this lifetime was to learn what to do with Grief. A colleague of mine even suggested changing my name to release this burden. 

 

As modern humans many of us have trained our nervous systems to avoid pain and always search for joy. Seek out joy. Avoid pain and discomfort.

 

But, what if we allow ourselves to go fully there when it arrives?To be in the eye of the storm to feel it, let it be seen, and ask it ‘what do you need from me right now’.  

 

To let our world collapse for the moment and surrender in whole heartbreakingly heartedly to the rise of that complex feeling. 

 

Loneliness. Whilst grief seems to extend out clouding our entire surroundings with pain, for me loneliness weaves in beckons and pulls us DOWN from the heart, down. Almost like an entity has taken the centre of your chest, dragged it down and it feels like you’ve got weights tied to your gut. Like you’ve been sucked down to hell for a moment with the ‘devil’ to wallow and trudge. Often we attach it to mental stories or search out its destruction by whatever our coping mechanisms are. Food. Booze. Sugar. Drugs. Netflix. Maybe sex if that’s your tipple.  What’s your favourite numbing agent?

 

No one ever seemed to talk about grief or loneliness as I was growing up, perhaps they do more in modern society

 

 It feels like something that we only really get to discover for ourselves.
In our quiet moments of solitude it can creep in like a silent tornado and polk away at our soul.

 Perhaps  in tribes or cultures such as in Ireland, this is more of a shared experience but I feel in my society it was just avoided as a whole. 

 

So what are they here to teach us, do you think? 

 

For me maybe it’s the nature of polarity. If most of us choose to not live out ‘the middle way’ the buddhist path of no great joy and thus less great pain then we have to feel those ‘crunch’ periods. No light without shadow. No joy without pain. No love without apathy yadar yadar. 

 

 

I feel that loneliness could be here to teach us and show us where we are lacking that sense of connection and being seen. Whenever I’ve been in conscious living, co living, or part of a community that offers heart shares with like-hearted people I witness the void of loneliness literally diminishes PUFF I feel full again.

 

 

So maybe it reminds us of our essential tribal nature. We weren’t meant to walk the path alone.

 

 

Yet so much of modern society seems to divide and polarise us. The two extremes of collective consciousness seem more polarised than ever (if we are to follow modern media and the news). 

And grief…Is grief here to really show us the power of love and the power of faith? Or am I romanticising it? Cos it’s raw and palpable when it comes. 

You know the film Interstellar? You know that part where they land on Planet Miller? There is a whole moment of WOW a water planet, wahoo life. And then, they notice a 200 foot wall of water coming their way? And realise quickly it’s a wave? (I get shiver thinking of it) 

 

That for me is that feeling of the depths of grief. 

 

Grief shows us the depths of our human hearts, and our fragility. 

 

 

 

What about you?

 

Do you experience loneliness?

 

Grief?

 

In what ways do you manage it? 

 

What do you think it’s here for?