Overcoming Grief and Loss: You can’t go over, under, or around it, you must go through it! Our earliest socialization tells us: Don’t Feel Bad, Be Strong, Don’t Burden Others With Your Feelings. Using just those few incorrect ideas, we develop a default position that suggests we shouldn’t feel bad in the first place.

Download our free Grief Recovery Method Guide for Loss Ebook

If we’re taught not to feel bad—when feeling bad is the normal and natural reaction to a grief-producing event—it makes it almost impossible for us to access healthy guidance to go through grief, rather than trying to bypass it by going over, under, or around it.

The first thing we must do if we want to deal with our grief effectively, is to allow our grief to exist by acknowledging it, and by communicating openly about it to people with whom we feel safe.

Overcoming Grief And Then Dealing With Unresolved Grief

Grief is the normal and natural reaction to loss of any kind. The range of reactions and emotions in response to grief-producing events is as wide as there are people on the planet. It is said that “Everyone grieves in their own way and at their own pace.” We agree.

But experiencing grief, even in our own way and at our own pace, is not the only issue. For example, when someone important to us dies, or when we get divorced, we are always left with some things we wish had been different, better, or more; and with some unrealized hopes, dreams, and expectations about the future.

Those six words:

• different
• better
• more
• hopes
• dreams
• expectations

These are the keywords that can help us discover what was left emotionally incomplete for us as the result of a death, a divorce, or any other loss. We call those unfinished or incomplete things Unresolved Grief.

The Hardest Part About Overcoming Grief Is That We’re Taught That It’s Too Difficult

When we first coined the phrase Grief Recovery 40 years ago, many people said, “I didn’t know that recovery from grief was even possible.” In fact, many people believed—and some still believe—that once stricken by grief, it is a permanent condition. That’s just not true.

The actions of the Grief Recovery Method that help grieving people deal with their unresolved grief are very accessible to anyone who’s willing to take those actions. They are relatively easy to do, even though we might think that they are hard because we were never taught they exist or how to do them, and because we may have believed the myth that grief is permanent and recovery is impossible.

Invest An Hour Of Your Life To See If You Can Overcome Your Grief

If you’re willing to invest just a bit of time reading one section of The Grief Recovery Handbook, you’ll discover for yourself that overcoming grief is possible.

Here’s an offer you can’t refuse: go to your local library or bookstore and find a copy of The Grief Recovery Handbook. Read the first 58 pages [Part One]. When you’ve read just that section you will either know and believe that recovery is possible, or you will still think that you can’t move beyond your grief. In any case, you will have invested only an hour of your life to find a crucial answer that can change your life for the better.

If you found this article helpful, we suggest you may want to read:

7 Signs You're Experiencing Unresolved Grief

The Best Grief Definition You Will Find

Grief Books: The 5 Best Books Ever Written on Grief Recovery

We have several free eBooks you can also download to read or you can visit our Grief Blog and search for other articles on a wide range of topics related to understanding grief.

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