I recently listened to a video by Megan Fate Marshman. If you aren't familiar with her, Megan lost her husband at 38 years old to a heart-attack very unexpectedly. Here is what she writes about grief:
We don't need to grieve alone. We need to get it out with the people God sends into our life. We can:
1. Go through pain (the way we should travel)
2. Go back to the trauma (to avoid the pain -- or so we think)
3. Ignore the pain
Grief is a mess. We want to be plucked out of the pain, but God wants to to be present with us in it. If we don't grieve, we will look for relief from the pain somewhere else. Unhealthy options are an attempt to relieve the pain. (These can include: drinking, sex, drugs, busyness, etc.)
In my case, I also would turn my grief into a focus on anxiety or other "problems" in my life. This was another way to not actually sit in pain.
We can't heal what we are unwilling to feel. If we don't acknowledge God in our grief, we will live out of the stage we are stuck in!
Grief is the anecdote to trauma. Trauma leaves us stuck. Grief has the power to move us. Avoiding grief keeps us stuck. Talk about it. You are going somewhere when you talk about it.
The #1 indicator of people who grieve and move thru trauma is having a community to process pain together. It brings out good things from people who listen to it as well.
Psalms 34:18 says "The Lord is close to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit." He isn't just near. He grieves with us.
John 11: 35 says "Jesus wept." He knew Lazarus was coming back. He didn't take a shortcut away from the tears. There is nothing wrong with grief. We need to let others grieve too.
Isaiah 53:13 says "He's the man of sorrows." Don't suppress grief. Grief is the hope that things are not supposed to be this way.
"The opposite of joy is not sadness, it's hopelessness."
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