Sex Upgraded Grief, Sex and Relationships - with Josh Fox
In this episode we'll explore:
- What is grief?
- How does grief affect relationships and our sex lives?
- What happens if we don’t integrate our grief?
- How to grieve in a healthy way, and why doing this can be beautiful
- What is a grief ceremony, and where can you find one?
TOPICS & TIMES:
- 3:44 - What is grief?
- 9:08 - What happens if you don't deal with grief?
- 15:39 - How does grief affect relationships and sex?
- 28:13 - How can you tell if you have unresolved grief?
- 32:07 - Unresolved grief lives in your body, not the mind.
- 35:05 - What is a grief ceremony? (And how do you grieve in a healthy way).
- 44:00 - Grief in community.
- 47:00 - I cried during Spiderman. (And how crying gives you strength).
- 51:21 - Techniques to work with grief.
- 59:07 - How to deal with a breakup.
Grief can be tricky to notice because we don’t talk about it much as a society.... For the most part, we don’t even acknowledge it exists. Grief is different from the sadness you might experience when watching a movie, and you can even have unresolved grief and not know it...
Unresolved grief can impact your romantic and sexual relationships, your family relationships, your work life, and how you feel as you go through your day… which in turn has a subtle impact on every single decision you make. It’s a big deal… And this is part of the reason Josh Fox devotes a substantial amount of his health care practice to helping people work through their grief.
RESOLVING YOUR GRIEF MAKES LIFE (AND SEX) AMAZING!
How do you resolve your grief? Actually allowing yourself to FEEL emotions can be a good place to begin. This can be tricky though, because almost every message we've gotten from society says to NOT feel your feelings. It’s so important to actually allow your feelings to move, so they don’t get stuck in your body. (Techniques in the episode).
WHAT IS A GRIEF CEREMONY?
In this episode, Fox describes the grief ceremonies he facilitates as day-long events that start with authentic connection exercises and embodiment practices to get you really present and in your body. Then the grief ceremony moves into a more emotive phase where the process of grieving (actually crying, yelling and screaming) can happen in community. There is an ancestor/grief altar where you can place images of any deceased loved ones, and you’re invited to visit this altar throughout the ritual whenever you feel called.
Grieving in community is an important part of this ceremony, because it normalizes the process of grief, and it provides support for everyone to see and actually feel in their bodies that they are not alone. Grief is a shared experience with all other humans, and on the other side of grieving is great release and the potential for more joy and pleasure than you’ve possibly imagined.
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
- “The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief” - by Francis Weller
- “Atlas of the Heart” by Brené Brown
CONNECT WITH FOX:
TAYLOR'S LINKS: