Messy Grief Heart. Grief expressed through lamenting can feel like uprooting a tree. Hoh Rain Forest. Olympic National Park. September 2020. Photo by anne richardson.
Listening in the Dark of Autumn & Winter
I love this time of year. The Winter Solstice arriving in less than a month in the Northern Hemisphere. Long nights sometimes crisp with stars and haloed moon. At other times heavy and dangerous in fog. Layers of clothing donned for outings…or even to work at home, cocoon me. Bare-limbed trees holding empty nests seem vulnerable. Low-sky sun barely warms Earth.
The other day when I began my pre-dawn ritual, readying for a walk, I checked in with my body, and it asked ever so sweetly if it could crawl back beneath the covers and rest. A mini-hibernation. My morning walks are part exercise and part meditation, so I am reluctant to miss them. The morning wasn’t rain-soaking or freezing or blustery—a ready excuse. Actually, it would have offered a seductive sunrise. I didn’t argue though. I listened, hibernated, drifting into my imaginal world if only for an two extra hours.
This learning to listen to my body. To let go of a routine and be curious about lingering in a hibernal space a little longer. Seeing if expansion can occur in the container of semi-sleep instead of arms outstretched toward the eastern sky from the top of The Summit. It has come with aging. With wisening. It includes appreciation and acknowledgement that I have choices.
Mother Ocean as Wise Mentor
Two weeks ago, seven months after my last extended trip to the Oregon Coast, I returned, able to hunker down with my own food supply in a cozy room, feeling pandemic-secure. It was now autumn—one of my favorite coastal seasons. Mother Ocean, such a wise mentor, had prepared her lesson plan. I was her eager student. She was all invitation. She shared about the ephemeral nature of life as she laid foam upon the sand, only to have it dissipate in a breeze. She began clear and expansive, her horizon a round belly pregnant with future. She dazzled that horizon before settling in for the night. Spectators on shore awed appreciation, waiting for the last threads of day to fall away.
Oregon Coast Sunset Awes. Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach, OR. November 2020. Photo by anne richardson.
Where stream water approaches salt, life thrives. Cannon Beach, OR. Novmember 2020. Photo by anne richardson.
From Ephemeral to Embodied
The next day her horizon was shrouded in gray shifting my focus to tangled driftwood roots where seaweed and feathers shelter. To the nonchalant meeting between fresh and salt water where a light rain joins in the reunion. To geese resting before rising to continue south. To a red mushroom nestled among grasses. She was nudging me to contract. To notice the ordinary. To be awed by the ordinary. Reminding me of being present to this embodied life.
“Lament: a passionate expression of grief or sorrow”
After THE STORM, reflection. Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach ,OR. November 2020. Photo by anne richardson
Lament Releases Grief
A STORM was forecast. Like pent up grief, Mother Ocean’s storm waited until deep in the night to come ashore. Its arrival, a keening. A demand to be heard. By morning, she is spent. One final walk again reflects the ephemeral nature of life as sea foam is skittish as it comes ashore. Wet shore mirrors clouds drawing threads of pink from the rising sun. And sand has taken refuge in the root tangle with the seaweed and feathers. The monoliths are still on watch. This beach is timeless and time-pregnant. With Mother Ocean’s lessons still fresh in my heart, I head home. I am grateful. Always grateful for what she offers.
My Wise Mentors: Grief & Mother Ocean
Mother Ocean must have teamed up with my other mentor, Grief, while she was keening in the night. Reminded me that being grateful doesn’t mean one can’t wail. Can’t lament. That both/and again. Reminded me I had an undeveloped idea about a laments workshop. Now my two mentors were clear: offer “Voicing our Deepest Sorrows: The Gift of Lament in 2020,” before the end of the year. It became clear that folx in the year 2020 needed space to keen and express their grief.
My Mother, My Lament
Shortly after my mother died in February 2018, I drove to the beach. Night had gathered against the shore along with one of Mother Ocean’s storms. I got out of my car and wailed into the wind and rain. I lamented. I grieved. My heart expanding with each gust of wind that entered me until I thought I might be tossed up over the Coast Range with the fierceness of it. And then I was spent, contracting into the warmth of a small room with a makeshift altar, grateful for the release.
A temporary remembrance altar to my mother after a storm of lamenting. February 2018.
World Wide Lament December 31st?
While I honor the idea of offering a “moment of silence” at memorial gatherings, I wonder what it would look like, sound like, feel like, if we offered a minute or more to lament. To wail. To keen. To sing our songs of crying out. Read our poems of despair. In a collective voice at such gatherings. A release. What if December 31st at 1pm if we stopped and lamented wherever we are in the world. It cascaded worldwide for 24 hours. I wonder???
Free Gift of Lament Workshop
Here is my offering to you: a FREE two hour workshop. Available Dec. 13th or Dec. 17th. Open to anyone who needs to lament a loss arising out of 2020. If you need to keen. To wail your words onto the page. To speak them aloud. To release. Interested? See details below.
“Sun has not even risen & Rain
is toiling, making
up for the lack of Summer
presence. Remorseful even.
Pelting the brim of my hat,
slipping down my spine to
join growing Street Streams.
I consider my Vow
to Gratitude,”
And What of Gratitude?
How do lamenting and gratitude coexist? Here is where the duality of life enters in. That I can hold the depth of lamenting. Crying out. Be angry at all the unfairness…and still be grateful. I have written before how gratitude is one of my core values. I was composing a new poem the other day and, like they have a mind to do, this one took a turn and the line “I consider my Vow to Gratitude,” spilled onto the page. “A vow to gratitude?” That surprised me and it felt right. It also asks a higher level of commitment from me. That I am to be grateful for muck as well as starlight. And it doesn’t negate the need to lament.
Considering Beliefs on Gratitude
This week in the United States the focus is on gratitude. “Thanksgiving,” an official holiday. The actual “day” I will be a gathering of one. My family has decided to minimize risk of exposure to the coronavirus. I am grateful I have a warm place to eat and rest and can look forward to future gratitude meals when we emerge into our new normal. I have chaplain colleagues that are working in hospitals and for hospice. Their stories are heartrending. They are suffering from the suffering. Why would I want to do anything that might increase their caseloads? Their heartache.
And there’s this thought on gratitude. Though it is a core practice of mine, I invite you to reflect on your own beliefs and perceptions about gratitude. It has become “prescriptive” in our society that one “just needs to focus on what they are grateful for” to improve their outlook. There have even been studies done on the effectiveness of this on health. However, you may not have the energy or emotional bandwidth to take on yet another “life improvement project.” Another “thing to try and then fail at.” Ugh. I’ve done my share of those. So while I am not advocating NOT being grateful, just offering the invitation to do your own reflection.
Living the Both/And of Gratitude and Lamenting
One of my favorite poets is Jane Kenyon (1947-1995.) She had chronic depression, relished and struggled with life, questioned and dove into her faith. She died of leukemia at age 48. Her final book of poetry, Otherwise, New and Selected Poems, reflects her complex life journey as well as the deep relationship she had with her husband, poet Donald Hall (1928-2018.) Her poetry is rich with lament, gratitude, noticing the ordinary, being in nature and community. Perhaps I’m reading too much into this, but I sense in reading her words that gratitude did not come easily for Jane.
Upon my own reflection, perhaps gratitude is best not easily offered, but deeply considered. That is the nugget I’ve discovered as I’ve written this post.
My Deepest Gratitude
Finally, I am grateful (and I do mean that in a deeply considered way) to you for reading my posts and coming along with me on the journey. My posts always take a turn from conception to completion! And maybe a word or two even resonates with your life. Please forward my posts if you are inclined! Also, let others who may be interested know about the workshop.
As the dark continues to lengthen until we tip toward light again, may you find nourishment and abundance in unexpected ways. And may you be safe as this holiday season unfolds.
in deep gratitude,
anne
For Your Reflection
Has there been a time in your life where you have let loose and wailed a loss? How did you feel afterward? If you haven’t, do you wish you had? Can you give yourself permission now?
What do you long to lament in 2020? Is the list lengthy, short, somewhere in-between? Are you judging anything on the list as not being worthy of being included?
How about gratitude? How does it fit into your life? Does it feel “rote” as in “I have to be grateful because I’m told so?” Are you grateful for “everything” that happens? Selective? No judging. Just reflect on your beliefs, thoughts and feelings about gratitude.
For some folx, the long dark nights of autumn and winter are a difficult time. If this is you, how are you caring for yourself by extending gentleness and kindness?
On Dec. 31st, if you have a mind to, will you keen, wail, lament wherever you are at 1pm to close out 2020?
The standard question: What are old ways of coping that are still working for you? Try not to judge them as “good or bad.” Just notice how they help you through the day. What is no longer working? And, have you found any new ways of coping? As always, please be gentle and kind as you reflect.
Upcoming FREE Workshop
Voicing Our Deepest Sorrows: The Gift of Lament in 2020
Register Today. Space Limited.
Sunday, December 13th 3-5pm PST
or
Thursday, December 17th, 4-6pm PST
Questions Without Answers
“How could you abandon me!” “It isn’t fair.” “I feel so alone.” “He was my rock.” “Why does this keep happening.” “We did everything right, why us?” “I should have been there.” Why, why, why… Unanswerable questions. Passionate emotions. Hearts broken.
Lament As Medicine
The year 2020. It has been unlike any other in recent history. Rocking many of us to our core. Lamentable. The lament, “a passionate expression of grief or sorrow,” has been used across time, cultures & spiritual traditions to allow for the outpouring of broken hearts. To give voice to suffering. To wail in the darkness. To rail against injustice. To name losses. To direct thoughts and feelings to “someone” who is believed to be listening. Shared in community or cried out on a dark night alone, the lament can offer the powerful medicine of being heard.
That “someone” who the lament is directed toward? It may be God, The Universe, a Higher Power, humanity in general, those in power, your community. In this workshop, it is who you deem it to be from your own belief system.
Experiential Loss Workshop
This is a two hour experiential workshop. We will look at laments in poetry and song to “prime the pump,” then using writing portals, participants will be invited to write a lament and share within our safe container. Our closing ritual will be engaging in a Labyrinth Experience using finger labyrinths (to be provided.) No writing or labyrinth experience is necessary to participate, just an open and courageous heart. Each workshop is limited to 12 participants.
This workshop is for you if:
You have experienced a loss in the year 2020 that has disrupted your life. Rocked your world. Left you reeling. (It does not need to be directly related to the pandemic.)
You are wanting to invite that loss out into the open. Give it a voice. To “wail.”
Any of the questions in the opening sound familiar or invite similar ones.
You have been told, “Everyone is going through something, just get over it,” and sense you have been sitting on your Grief. That Grief wants to speak.
