How to Process Grief: Emotional Honesty

“It's not time that heals, it's what we do in that time.”

–Dawn Michele Jackson

We don’t do grief well. And unprocessed grief has consequences. I’m talking with grief specialist Dawn Michele Jackson about what we get wrong about grief and processing loss. 

Grief isn’t just about death — it is a natural reaction to any kind of loss. Your kids leaving home, changes in your body, moving, changing jobs, divorce, losing a close friend,  … and yes, death. We can grieve very personal losses or public and collective losses.

You’ve probably heard that time heals, but it isn’t that simple. Let’s talk about how to actually face loss and work through our grief.

We talk about: 

• Not saying “I know how you feel” and what to do instead
• What happens when you don’t deal with grief — and why we often don’t address it
• How even happy things can cause grief
• How losses can compound
• Giving people an opportunity to talk about who or what they’ve lost
• Why you shouldn’t hand a grieving person a tissue — and other ways to allow people to have their emotional response

ABOUT DAWN

Dawn Jackson draws on three decades of nursing experience and her expertise as an Advanced Grief Recovery Method Specialist to help others heal their hearts, transform their lives, and rediscover joy. She is the bestselling author of Journey to Peace and Healing and Journey to Self Discovery: 100 Days of Soulful Reflections, as well as a contributing author to multiple international bestselling anthologies.

LINKS

• https://www.dawnmichelejackson.com/
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/dawn-michele-jackson/
• https://www.facebook.com/dawnmichelejackson
• Pause magazine (Find Dawn in issue 2): https://plansimple.com/magazine

DOABLE CHANGES

At the end of every episode, we share three doable changes, so you can take what you've heard and put it into action. Action is where change happens.

Even though we want big change, it’s really little things done over and over that make the difference. So pick a doable thing. Put it in your calendar. Weave it through your days for a week and then move on to the next one. It will have a snowball effect.

Here are three Doable Changes from this conversation:

• FEEL YOUR OWN GRIEF. What have you lost recently? Have you allowed yourself to feel it? Are you staying busy and numbing? What if you opened up to your feelings?
• BECOME A LISTENING HEART. Next time somebody mentions a loss to you, instead of telling them you know how they feel or giving them a platitude to make them feel better. Try listening. Ask them about the person or pet or thing they lost. Give them a chance to talk.
• MODEL GRIEVING TO OTHERS. You don’t have to be strong and keep your emotions in. Show your kids and others around you that it’s okay to feel and express your feelings. That might mean crying about a loss or letting people around you know you are having a sad or hard day.