Which Way to Go?

A grief burst is an sudden huge burst of emotion that you can’t escape. Bursting upon your heart unexpectantly you are grabbed and slammed into a dark pit. You become overwhelmed by grief emotions you may have not even known you held inside your soul.

I learned this in my recent classes about grief but then experienced a grief burst myself the other week. The class taught me the definition, but life brought me the reality.

For two nights, I cried. No, I sobbed. I could barely catch my breath. Overwhelmed by losses I wept. My brother died June 14. We were not close and as adults barely communicated, but still my sibling was dead. Then another broken relationship shattered once again reopening a deep wound. My soul hurt.

I wrote in my journal:

What am I grieving?
Yes, the loss of a sibling
But more than that.
Tears rise from broken relationships
A life not fully lived.
All the “what could have been.”
The loneliness of what actually is.

My prayer those two nights were sniveling self-pity laments. A normal human reaction but still unsettling and draining. My spiritual director says to pay attention to your tears. Another director suggested that tears reconnect you to your baptism, those holy waters that remind you that you are a beloved of God’s. And Danish author Isak Dinesen’s says, “The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea.”

Exhausted, I finally became quiet and laid my head on God’s lap. “I’m sad. Lord, I feel alone. It’s so dark here.”

Then I heard God’s comforting whisper– “I will be your light.”

“God is light and in him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).

Ahhh, Love flickered hope.

I sat in this blackness, but a faint glow now accompanied me. What should I do? Stay in the shadows or turn and take small steps towards the light? Which way to go?

In darkness we have the choice. Stay or reach out for light.

I choose light.

I am grateful God is always with us even when we can’t see God through our tears. God’s presence doesn’t take away the grief or pain but lights a candle and shows us the way forward. All of us will find ourselves lost in the shadows at times throughout our human journey. Hope grows even in the dark.

All this turmoil reminded me of one of my favorite writers, Barbara Brown Taylor and her book Learning to Walk in the Dark. I recorded some of quotes from that book in my journal. Perhaps her words may shine light on your journey too:

“There is a light that shines in the darkness, which is only visible there.”

“…new life starts in the dark. Whether it is a seed in the ground, a baby in the womb, or Jesus in the tomb, it starts in the dark.”

“After years of being taught that the way to deal with painful emotions is to get rid of them, it can take a lot of reschooling to learn to sit with them instead, finding out from those who feel them what they have learned by sleeping in the wilderness that those who sleep in comfortable houses may never know.”

“I always wondered why it took “three days” for significant things to happen in the Bible–Jonah spent three days in the belly of the whale, Jesus spent three days in the tomb, Paul spent three days blind in Damascus–and now I know. From earliest times, people learned that was how long they had to wait in the dark before the sliver of the new moon appeared in the sky. For three days every month they practiced resurrection.”

“I learned that sadness does not sink a person; it is the energy a person spends trying to avoid sadness that does that.”

Wisdom from the dark and our human experience of grief. I used to bury my emotions or deny them completely. Now I listen to them and learn. Learn the way of love.

May you find the light in the darknesses of your life.