The Darkened Window

“I miss the light, the color, the brightness that used to shine in my life.  It’s like the world has gone dark.  Everything is in shadow.”

These words were spoken by a middle-aged woman whose husband had died a few weeks before the visit.    In the time since the funeral she has done remarkably well.  She has leaned on her grown children for support.  She found her way through the initial rituals of grief.  Her friends and extended family have been welcomed into her journey.  From all outward indications, she was coping well and making her way through a very difficult grief.

We met for coffee.  It was a simple follow-up.  At least, that is what I believed before the visit.  It did not take long before her voice began to break, and her eyes became soft and teary.  After a long pause she shared her heart-felt words.  “It’s like the world has gone dark.”  For the rest of the hour she spoke of her yearning for a life freed from grief.  In the end she knew she would have to wait for the light to return. 

I wanted to reach out and turn on the light with some pithy little snippet of wisdom.  It was very uncomfortable sitting in the dark with her.  But, my only choice to wait with her.  The light switch was far beyond my reach.  The darkness was not caused by a lack of light outside of her life.  It was a darkness that grew out of her inner life.  It grew out of a love that was lost in the darkness of loneliness, hopelessness, and pain.  The best I could do was offer her a physical and emotional presence that would reassure her that she was not alone.  I could give her a little energy that she could use to hold on until the light began to dawn somewhere in her mind and soul.  But it was her darkness and she would have to find her way through it.

Knowing the future is always a challenge.   At best we can only guess.  Sometimes we feel good about our guesses.  But most of the time we do not have a great deal of confidence in our “futuring.”  As financial planners like to remind their clients, “Past performance is no guarantee of future results.”  But we have learned to live with varying degrees of uncertainty by “hedging our bets” and “spreading out our risk.”  We keep our eye on what the present is telling us about the future and act accordingly.  In the end, it is all a guess and the best we can expect is to be right some of the time. 

What happens when we are not even able to see far enough to be able to make a guess?  Grief takes away what little future we can see or imagine.  As the widow said a little later in the conversation, “I couldn’t imagine living without him!”

In grief, the window on the future goes dark.  There is no future, only a painful present and a remembered past.  Have you ever looked out of a window on a darkened street with no moon or streetlights?  What did you see?  It is likely that all you saw was a reflection of yourself and the room behind you. A window on a darkened world is no longer a window on the future.  It has become a mirror that reflects the painful present and the painfully remembered past.  Everything else is hidden in the shadows of darkness.

The window is reflecting the inward-turning self.   The world is still out there somewhere but our attention has become enslaved to the “in here.”  That inwardness brings loneliness, hopelessness, and a more intense experience of our pain.  Our inner life becomes our whole world. 

Be patient with your grief and wait for a light.  There will come a time when a flicker of light will appear in your future.  It may come with a grandchild’s hug or a bit of good news that challenges your expectations.  It may be a note card from a friend or a moment when you can see yourself living beyond our grief.  When this light begins to shine beyond our lives, it will draw our attention away from our loss and help us see ahead once again.  The darkened window will open us to the other side of our grief.  The light may flicker on and off for a while.  But, be patient.  It will grow brighter, in time.

Those of us on the outside of their grief may believe that we can see their future a bit more clearly. 

We may try and clean the window with ill-advised words and actions, but the window is not dirty.  Telling them that “They should not be sad because…” or offering to take over doing everything their loved one did for them may make us feel better, but it will not help them deal with the inner darkness. 

We can try and describe what we see in the distant future, but this is far beyond the grieving person’s ability to see.   Phrases like “You will find someone else” or “You can have other children” are cruel and disrespectful of the grief they are experiencing for their loved one.

Often, we stand behind them and try to shine the light of our faith on their window.  But the glare of our faith may make it more difficult for them to see their own faith in their reflection. 

Instead of trying to “brighten” their lives, our job is to stand beside them so that they can see that they are not alone.  The light will return but only they will be able to see it.  It is their window, their grief.  We can be there to hear them when they feel like talking their way through it.  We can listen without judgment and let them know that their tears will not chase us away.  Rejoice with them when they see a little light.  Otherwise, be respectful of their grief and allow them to walk into the future in their own time.  

The light will shine.  It will overcome the darkness of grief, but only in the mystery of time itself.

Blessings,

Bob

Why Grief?

The night sky at Garner State Park - Fall 2016

If you are new to your grief, this article may not make sense to you yet.  If so, then lay it aside for another day.  If, however, your grief has been your daily companion for quite a while, it may help you identify things that may be bubbling just beneath the surface.  I encourage you to read on and allow your own inner voice to respond to these ideas.  If they still do not make sense to you, set it aside but you may want to keep it within reach.

Grief has a way of consuming our whole lives.  It colors every moment and strives to block out the joy and hope that shines upon us.  But there is more to grief than sadness or feelings of loss.  There is more to it than pain and isolation.  Like the night sky, there is more than darkness if we have the soul to see it.  In the first weeks or months of grief we may not believe that our grief will ever be any less consuming.  We may not be ready to accept that there is more than our hurting and that the path will continue.  But grief has an enormous power to transform our lives.  It can help a new person emerge from the sackcloth and ashes of our loss. 

In the next page or so I will share what I have learned from walking through my own grief and the journeys others have shared with me.

First of all, like other types of deep pain, grief tells us that something significant has happened.  Whenever we stub our toe, the pain tells us that there is something wrong and we need to pay attention to it.  When we experience a loss of someone who is part of our lives, we experience grief.  The deeper our relationship with them the deeper is our experience of grief.  The grief tells us that we need to pay attention because something important and possibly life-changing, has occurred.

Some may argue that this is too obvious to even mention.  But I have worked with a significant number of grieving people who worked very hard at ignoring their pain.  “I’m okay!  I just need a little time.”  “He was a friend, but we all expected it.  I’ll get over it.”  “Life goes on!”  We dismiss our grief because it is unwelcome, unwanted, inconvenient, and uncontrollable.  But the pain of grief exists to force us pay attention to the loss that evoked the grief.  When the loss is powerful enough it may lead us to set aside everything else so that we can engage in the work of grief that promotes healing.

Second, grief allows us to build a catalogue of cherished memories annotated with things we have learned.  This is especially true when we have lost someone who has been part of a lives for a very long time.  It is natural that we share stories about our relationship to and memories of the deceased.  On the surface, these stories help us maintain our connections.  But as we tell and re-tell them, they become a way of celebrating and acknowledging our gratitude for their life.  These stories change over time.  These “annotations and amendments” include the meaning that these people held for us.  They are a way of reconstituting our inner lives that transforms the deceased from being a simple memory into a living memory, part of our daily lives.  Along with the wisdom in these living memories, we find great comfort in the continuing presence they bring to our everyday living.

Third, grief gives our mind, body, and soul time to resync into a new sense of self.  Our self-understanding takes a hit when we lose someone who has been part of who we are.  We are, in large part, defined by our relationships to those around us.  Grief gives us room to live into new relationships when an old relationship has ended due in a deep loss.   A spouse becomes a widow or widower.  A loving care-taker child becomes a survivor.  Many of these new relationships lack a name.  For example, there are no words to define our new relationship when we lose a sibling, a close friend, a mentor, a protégé, or a child.  It is as if society does not consider them to be important enough to name or offers us ways to cope.  But the loss is real and can be life-changing. 

These new relationships will take time to explore and understand.  Grief gives us room to deal with all the things that need to be addressed.  Socially, this has been called “a period of mourning” or “bereavement leave.”  We do not expect grieving people to step back into their previous roles without some time to do the work of grief.  We generally give ourselves time to get back on our feet.  During this time we explore and resync our lives with those we have lost as well as those who continue to walk with us.

Lastly, grief offers us the opportunity to acquire the knowledge, skills, and attitudes of a new life.  When we lose someone who has been a partner in our daily lives, we may need to learn to live without the things they provided.  A surviving spouse may need to learn the household “books”, pay the bills, and manage the finances.  They may need to re-discover how to wash the clothes or prepare a meal.  They may need to learn to drive and take care of the car.  They may also have to have help getting through the probate process or packing up and disposing of the deceased personal belongings.  IT may also be as ordinary and learning to sleep alone.  Grief opens up our lives to learning new knowledge, skills, and attitudes.

Prior to our loss, we may have believed that household chores were “women’s work.”  In grief we find that they were hard work and valuable contributions to our lives.  We may have minimized the effort it took for our partner to pay the bills and manage the investments.  In grief we discover the difficulty and challenges that their loved one endured just to keep the family “afloat.”  We may have taken our relationship with the deceased for granted.  But in grief we come to realize how fortunate we were to have them in our lives.  Further, we may be encouraged to journey into the unknown and overcome our fears as we take more and more of those things upon ourselves.

In closing, as you walk through the shadowed valley, there will be moments when the shadows of grief become overwhelming.  Allow them to surround you and hold you close.  But keep an eye open for a small light that may be shining in that darkness.  It may be the light of a new bit of knowledge, a new skill, or a better attitude breaking through the gloom.  It may be the glimmer of a new sense of who you are as you resync with your changed world.  It could be a story about your loved one that has come to light and brings a hint of joy to your soul.  It may simply be the knowledge that you have loved and been loved by the one you have lost.  That realization may create a little space where gratitude and healing may plant its seed. 

The most beautiful nights are when the moon stays below the horizon and we are able to gaze upon the millions of stars that shine through the darkness.  They do not chase the darkness away.  However, they help us to know that the night is more than darkness.  Your grief is much more than sadness and pain.  It is also hundreds of little moments when you can see a light shining in the darkness and know that you are not alone. 

Blessings on your journey through the Shadowed Valley.

Bob