How To Grieve For The Loss Of A Loved One: Learn The One Big Mistake You Don’t Want To Make
Photo by Tina Keller
When you have lost a loved one, whether by breaking up with a girlfriend, through a divorce, or even because of a death, you are in pain. While it is human nature to avoid pain and seek pleasure, the biggest mistake you can make when grieving is to try to avoid feeling the pain when you really are in pain.
Unfortunately, most of us are masters of trying to hide how we feel, to the point where it may even become hard to know what our true feelings are. Many theories and techniques have been created by well-intentioned therapists, counselors, and coaches for dealing with grief. But there seems to be one fundamental flaw in some of their thinking – that is, they try to help you avoid feeling the actual pain when suffering a grievous loss.
While it may be beneficial to try to avoid pain whenever possible, it is not healthy to do so when you are actually experiencing the pain. If you see a fire, it is smart to avoid getting too close and burning yourself. However, if you accidentally touch a hot stove, the pain you feel helps your brain send healing energies to your wound.
When we are in physical pain, we often don’t have a choice but to feel the pain.
With emotional pain, however, we do have the ability to choose whether to feel or suppress it. While this suppression makes us feel better for a short time, in the long run, this will never help us heal and move on.
Using our minds to suppress feelings is equivalent to medicating ourselves with drugs when we have a headache. We may get temporary relief, but the real cause of the headache remains unaddressed. Ironically, the reason for the headache may actually be the suppression of emotional pain.
So, how should you deal with the pain of losing a loved one? You have to feel the pain to heal it. The reason most people don’t allow themselves to do this is because they have never been taught how to feel pain and what to do with that feeling. Our parents did not know how nor have time to deal with emotional pain, and our school systems today certainly don’t teach students what to do about this either. So, often we are left with the advice of our friends or we are left to our own devices.
Many have tried to deal with deep emotional feelings without knowing how to properly process them and, as a result, have just become more stuck with grief, blame, or guilt, often giving feelings a bad name. Without proper direction, many have simply decided it is easier to give up rather than to feel the pain. After all, it is much easier to try to “medicate” yourself with hobbies, food, work, or even with drugs, and numb the pain rather than feel or heal it.
Fortunately, once you learn how to heal your pain, you will feel great relief and be able to move on with even more love in your heart. So, how do you do it?
First, determine whether overall you feel betrayed or shame regarding the loss of your loved one. If someone has left you, or if someone you love has died, you feel betrayed because they are now gone and have left you here, alone. If you were the one who left the relationship, or if you had an affair, or somehow felt you could not openly talk about the loss of your loved one, then you feel shame. It is also possible to feel both shame and betrayal.
Once you have determined what your overall feeling is, you are ready for the next step: to write a feeling letter. The purpose of this letter is to help you get in touch with your feelings and provide a structured way to go through the different layers of emotions associated with grief and loss. It is not important for the letter to be grammatically correct or even to make sense. Your goal is to try to feel the pain through getting in touch with different negative emotions and to fully release them.
If your primary feeling is betrayal, start by writing what you feel betrayed about. Then proceed to write what makes you feel angry, sad, or afraid. Write a few sentences about each emotion and try to actually feel the emotions as you are writing about them. Now write about any feelings of love and gratitude that have surfaced.
If your primary feeling is sorrow, start by writing what you feel sorry about. Then proceed to write what makes you feel frustrated, hurt, or scared. Continue the task as described in the previous paragraph, all the while remaining intimately in touch with each emotion. At the conclusion, you should have produced very deep, personal material that may surprise you as you re-read it.
It is always best to address the letter to the person that you are leaving or who left you and to imagine their full support. You can also address the letter to someone who has passed away. Simply imagine your partner listening you with love and understanding. Imagination is very powerful. Your brain will not know the difference between imagination and reality. There is no need to give or share this letter to anyone, other than maybe processing it with your coach or therapist. The purpose of this letter is to make yourself feel better and not to try to change, help, or teach your partner.
Try not to intellectualize the process too much. It is not important to write about the emotions in any particular order, but it is important to get in touch with each emotion as you write about it. Be aware that there are always many layers of different emotions associated with a break-up or a divorce. Often many of these emotions are buried underneath other emotions. While this process may sound simplistic, it is actually very powerful. I would encourage you to try it and feel its power.
Become aware of any resistance you may have in doing this exercise. Most of us have many built-in defense mechanisms that prevent us from feeling our emotions to their fullest, especially if that was the expectation of us as children. And most of us can admit to being in that category.
Be aware of when you say to yourself, “Oh this is just a waste of time,” or “I should just snap out of this.” How about, “I need to move on and not stay with this any more.” Or, “This is stupid, why I am even trying this?” “I don’t have time for this,” “I need to go wash the dishes,” and so on. This tendency for trying to avoid feeling our negative feelings is common. Most of us are experts at avoiding to feel the pain we are in. Don’t be one of those persons who talks himself or herself out of doing this important exercise. I promise you will feel much better after having done it. You may even notice that your body feels lighter or that the physical pain that’s been troubling you for the last bit seems to be melting away. That would be because physical pain is associated with your emotional state.
This exercise can take as little as 15 minutes. I recommend you do it whenever you notice that you are in emotional pain. The process of grieving takes time. Don’t expect to heal fully just by doing this exercise once. Eventually, you may find yourself wanting to spend more time exploring the emotions that surface.
By learning to listen to your emotions, you will learn to give love to yourself. Self-love is the basis for any good relationship. Take the time to listen to your pain and to heal your pain with love. You, and everyone around you, deserve it.
I hope this simple, yet powerful technique will help you as much as it has helped me.
If you would like a free more in-depth manual on how to do this technique, along with some of my personal sample “feeling” letters, simply put your name and e-mail address in the box and once I have it ready, I will send it to you via e-mail.
I wish you much love and healing,
Mikko Kemppe
