Grief transforms different people in different ways. As I go through the process of dealing with the loss of my Dad, and accepting and dealing with everything that has changed, it will have to bleed into what gets posted here. This has always been a diary of sorts, and sometimes it helps to write things out here to get them off my chest, or just to formulate wording for what is happening in my head. It can be dangerous to keep such things inside, and over the years I’ve learned when to let things out, and how to do it in a manner that might be seen by others in this sort of public forum. There’s a certain relief in simply getting things out, and there are other reliefs that come with someone who reads it and relates, and in my own re-reading of it from an analytical/editing perspective. A form of self-therapy, there is value in a certain degree of self-analysis. And on some level, my grief, and the way I move through it, will be a testament and memory of my Dad himself. It keeps him around me, it keeps him present. I’m not ready to lose that just yet.
What will come out in the next few weeks and months will likely be messy and raw and entirely uncomfortable for some, including myself. I’ve never had to grieve like this before. I don’t know how long it will take, or how it will happen, or if this will all be as futile and silly as it sometimes feels right now. I do know that writing things down has always helped, and stopping that now might result in me stopping forever. An object in motion tends to stay in motion while an object at rest tends to stay at rest. Dad was never one to rest, and he passed that on to me.
Back to Blog“No mud, no lotus. Both suffering and happiness are of an organic nature, which means they are both transitory; they are always changing. The flower, when it wilts, becomes the compost. The compost can help grow a flower again. Happiness is also organic and impermanent by nature. It can become suffering and suffering can become happiness again…
It is possible of course to get stuck in the “mud” of life. It’s easy enough to notice mud all over you at times. The hardest thing to practice is not allowing yourself to be overwhelmed by despair. When you’re overwhelmed by despair, all you can see is suffering everywhere you look. You feel as if the worst thing is happening to you. But we must remember that suffering is a kind of mud that we need in order to generate joy and happiness. Without suffering, there’s no happiness. So we shouldnt discriminate against the mud. We have to learn how to embrace and cradle our own suffering and the suffering of the world, with a lot of tenderness.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
