For the past several years, I have had the honor to hold space for hundreds of people in my Yoga for Grief workshops.   I added the subtitle:  Healing Hearts, Healing Bodies because I found that through a yoga practice that participants were able to release emotions that had become stuck in the body and helped them move through some very difficult mind states.   I also always knew that just a half day of yoga was not a miralce cure for the bereaved heart.   So what might one do to patiently tend to a healing heart during an extended time of grief?   In my own personal journey and from hearing from others, I have found that the following three activities have been helpful during the darker days of loss to channel the pain, anguish or even work through the numbness.   These three activities also provide a safe go to place even after the acute grief response has subsided and we come to realize that there will be waves of grief in the days, months, or years to come.   

1) Journaling.  

I started journaling when I was a teen and about two years before my mom became ill.  Journaling literally saved my life while I was trying to make sense of my mom's sudden death.   I look back at those journal entries and they were riddled with questions I still don't have the answers to, but allowed me a space to let my heart's voice be heard rather than shut down.  Over the years, journaling has become my free always availalbe therapist and I continue to write in a journal on a regular basis.   Of course, there are times when the journal sits at the bed side for weeks but for me it has become one of the best tools in times of loss and grief and I highly recommend checking out this website on grief journaling. 

2)  Tonglen Meditation.    

This is can be a powerful practice when done on a regular basis.   It is a Buddhist meditaiton that helps a grieving person find a way to sit with the suffering using the in-breath and find a way to release the pain, suffering, dispair, anger, or other unhealed energies so that we can open our hearts to feel relief, joy, forgiveness, and other healed emotions through the out breath.  Pema Chordron is a great Buddhist nun and has a graceful way of teaching Tonglen.  Check out Pema's teaching here.

3)  Creating an Altar in your home.  

I have to admit, that for me this was the hardest one to begin because I somehow though that a nondenominational eclectic animist like myself who didn't have any lineage or tradition to base building a sacred space in my home.   Then it dawned on me, that is all the more reason to build one!   No matter what your beliefs or nonbeliefs are, if you are mourning the loss of a beloved person, pet or the loss of some thing (i.e. a relationship, a job, health), you deserve to have an area in your home that helps to ground and center you!   And even though it took me years to find out how powerful my tiny little bookshelf altar would be in my healing journey, I laughed out loud when I searched the web for a 'how to build an altar in your home' and found the simplest of instructions.   Check out these three steps to creating an altar!

I am prone to borrow Mae West's wisdom at times like these:  "I didn't say it would be easy, I did say it would be worth it."     I hope you find these tips helpful.  And if you have any healing tools that you would like to share for a future Mindful Chatter, please email me!  

From my healing heart to yours, I wish you solace and peace in your healing journey.