DEATH — REBIRTH — TRANSFORMATION

These are some of my favorite passages in “Love, Loss, Light: Illuminating the Path Through Grief” by Karen Trench

 

— Like you, I have made decisions that required a certain amount of courage—important decisions made at critical junctures that have steered the course of my life. Those were the times when I voluntarily walked to the cliff’s edge, looked over, and with little or no trepidation, jumped— confident of a safe landing. When I was in control of my own choices, taking that leap of faith into the unknown tended to be easier. Plus, I had a firm understanding and appreciation of the transformative powers that resided within each and every big decision I made as my life unfolded.

But I never chose to lose Charlie. That decision was made for me, as the loss of your loved one was made for you. When I did lose him, I didn’t walk fearlessly to the cliff’s edge, look down into the chasm, and leap, with the assurance that I would arrive at the bottom relatively unscathed. Quite the contrary. I arrived at the edge the same way you did: Grief dragged me kicking and screaming, and then, without warning, pushed me.

As I plunged into the abyss, I tried to bargain with God. I offered up apologies, promises, and vows for past, present, and future actions if He would but spare me the agony that I knew awaited when I crash-landed. But He turned a deaf ear and a blind eye, and allowed me to sink deeper and deeper into the pit of my sorrow.

When I hit rock bottom, it wasn’t pretty. Three months after my loss, I returned from the first of several trips to the East Coast to visit my mom and some of my dearest friends. But I was returning to an empty house, and I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t bear the truth that Charlie would never again be home to greet me with a hug and a kiss. I ran into my garage and sequestered myself in my car to spare our two cats the trauma of hearing me wail, and now I laid across the back seat sobbing in anger and disbelief, until I exhausted myself and my tears ran dry. As I grew quiet, I began to appreciate the profound silence and the feeling of protection and safety that my car afforded me. I curled up in a fetal position and closed my eyes. As I began to doze off, I was struck with a sudden awareness. It was this: Either I could continue to fight against my new reality and remain in a state of incredulity, anger, and disbelief; or I could take my boxing gloves off and attempt to reconcile with the truth that God would not be bartering with me or sparing me my anguish. There was no escaping my plight, and the more time I spent resisting what had happened to me, the more time I would spend suffering. My choice was clear. I called a truce and surrendered to God, and it was there, in the back seat of my Subaru, where my salvation began.

Once I made the choice to align myself with Him and to place my complete faith and trust in Him, Universe, my archangels, and guardian angels—as soon as I opened my arms and my heart wide enough to “allow” them to help me with the hard work of grieving—amazing things began to happen. God began leading me to the exact people I needed to meet or see. He led me to the books I needed to read, to the words I needed to hear and write, and to the life lessons I needed to learn. It all moved me further down my path of grief and loss and aided me exponentially in my healing. The process of surrendering became inextricably linked to my transformation. I realized that if I was to become a butterfly, I would have to leave the caterpillar stage. I would have to completely give up my former life. And once I began to change, there would be no going back.

It’s impossible to carry the mantle of survivor without also carrying the mantle of transformation, for they are two sides of the same coin. This holds true whether we’ve endured and survived a life-threatening illness or accident or the death of a loved one. And by its very nature, being a survivor all but guarantees that we are not the same person we were before our trauma. There is no way we could be, for our survival has enhanced us—it has conferred upon us gifts and blessings: greater emotional or physical strength and fortitude, resilience, and self-confidence; a deepening of faith and self-awareness; a deeper love and compassion for self and others; and a far greater love and appreciation of life than we ever had before. To quote psychologist Susan Powers, PhD, from her book Ruthless Grieving, “Grief takes a hold of you and shakes all the “not you” from you, and what is left is so much closer to who you really are. So you shouldn’t want to be the same, and you are not, but in so many ways you have a chance to become more whole and more deeply yourself.”

Not only did Charlie’s death transform me in all the ways I outlined above, but his passing also gave me the impetus and the courage to resurrect my writing career. I take pride too in my ability to manage my home and finances, two challenges that when confronted, many widows find daunting. However, the most meaningful and profound transformation has been the deepening of my spirituality and spiritual practice. Beginning in the weeks preceding his death and continuing beyond it, I believed strongly that I was being guided by God and held in the arms of angels. Knowing that I still am and will always be guided is the greatest source of peace and comfort and the greatest blessing that has been bestowed upon me since losing Charlie. Grief transformed me into a spiritual seeker, and I look forward to spending the rest of my life discovering!

Whether we arrive at the cliff’s edge on our own terms or on God’s, the outcome is the same: transformation! Perhaps the likelihood that we’ll crash and burn is far greater when we are pushed over the edge, versus going there willingly, but we must take heart. We can learn from and be uplifted by the legend of The Phoenix, the bird who, after living five hundred years, burned itself on a funeral pyre only to rise again in a blaze of glory. We too can rise from the ashes of our pain and suffering and be completely reborn and made anew. Death. Rebirth. Transformation.

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