When grief comes to call

Artist unknown - please inform me if you are aware.

I once heard of an elderly man who would set the table for a guest, just in case someone showed up to join him for dinner, and he may welcome them in well. This is a beautiful sentiment that I would like to embrace generally, yet when it comes to friends, including our friend Grief, why wait for them to call?

I speak as someone called forth as a steward of the darkened path, to share the wisdom I have gained through my communing with Grief, as a guiding light for others, as they walk the liminal spaces between the worlds. As someone who lives close to Grief, both personally and now, professionally, the need to cultivate a dedicated practice to welcome Grief to my table is paramount, but then again, it always was.

I did not grow up being this welcome host; like many in our incresingly steralised, global northern culture, I was cut off from the wisdom Grief had to offer me, shrouded in further mystery which left me blind to the ferel ways, even though I was still required to wade within the quagmire of life. Ironically, the shroud of ‘protection’ in fact spurred my struggle, leaving me to sink deeper into the pits of (non)existence.

We all enter the darkness of the forest at some point - conscious or unconscious, chosen or forced - and so this is my invitation for you, for though you may not feel the same call to steward others as I do, a well life requires you tend the many faces of Grief which shadow you, and perhaps those who are closest to you.

Perhaps Grief has been knocking on your door for a while, throwing rocks up to your bedroom window, or whispering to you through the darkness as you sleep? Perhaps you thought you needed only to invite Grief the once? No, a good life requires us to cultivate a reciprocal relationship with Grief, a friendship, for it is a simple truth we will all know Grief throughout our lives, so let us cultivate loving terms.

And perhaps for you, Grief is like that person you greatly hope does not show up, even if you choose to invite them. Let me tell you that, unlike humans, which may not choose to show up uninvited, Grief holds no airs and graces, and does not care for your passive aggression.

Because Grief knows it is medicine; it is not quite the friend who begs you to take note, to read this, do this, stop this and try that. Not quite, for Grief is not fussed with fixing you, no, Grief desires you meet yourself whole, feral, messy. Grief desires you look at yourself bare and wash despair off your skin with tears, and howl at the moon. Because Grief knows.

Grief understands life is busy, and will give you some grace, but do not wait so long that Grief comes knocking on its own accord, we must remember to offer invitations regularly for Grief to commune with us, to keep our love tender, our hearts soft, and our souls open to thise experience called life.

We must make abundant space in our world, our life, our weeks and days; move pride and fear aside, so that tears may experience us without shame; for it is our ability to feel this deeply, which allows us to meet ourselves, and life, whole. There will always be tender spaces to meet with wider eyes and well-known hearts - what adventure lies ahead?

Do not shy away, close the blinds and hide under the duvet; understand you are an equal, walk towards and reach your hands into the dirt to feel the warm embrace of the truth of humanbeing; the rawness of sensation, as we connect to the fullness of life. For each up has its down, and you can not know life fully when you only embrace one side of the coin.

So, let us set an extra place at our table for our dear friend, Grief, and send the invitation.