Sorrow...and Joy

This evening when I sat down to write about joy and sorrow, I didn't have much inspiration. So, I began scrolling through my social media to see if I could get inspired. My goodness did the internet deliver! I ran into this article:

I spent several moments reading the whole article (and doing some grieving as well). You really should read the whole thing, but here were some highlights for me:

"Weller: In this culture we display a compulsive avoidance of difficult matters and an obsession with distraction. Because we cannot acknowledge our grief, we’re forced to stay on the surface of life. Poet Kahlil Gibran said, “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.” We experience little genuine joy in part because we avoid the depths. We are an ascension culture. We love rising, and we fear going down. Consequently we find ways to deny the reality of this rich but difficult territory, and we are thinned psychically. We live in what I call a “flat-line culture,” where the band is narrow in terms of what we let ourselves fully feel. We may cry at a wedding or when we watch a movie, but the full-throated expression of emotion is off-limits."

"Weller: If we have both an adequate level of companionship in our sorrow and periods of solitude that aren’t about distraction or avoidance, then grief will transform itself into tender melancholy. This life we have is incredibly short, but we’ve been blessed with it. When we shut off our grief, we forget that. To let grief work its alchemy on you yields gravitas, by which I mean the ability to be present with the bittersweet reality of life, which always includes loss. There’s no way to be spared sorrow . I wouldn’t even wish that upon someone. But we shouldn’t get stuck in our grief; it’s not a permanent address but a companion that walks beside us. Everything I love, I will lose. That’s the harsh truth. You either have to shut down your heart — and miss the love that is around you — or wrestle with that truth and come out the other end. There is indeed such a thing as joyful sorrow ."

"Weller: One of the most important things we can do right now in this culture is to grieve , because it is a protest against the collective agreement to turn our backs on what is happening. Just look at the headlines: earthquakes caused by fracking; multiple communities in distress following the killing of African American men by police; more and more economic inequality; carbon-dioxide levels going over four hundred parts per million. It is easy to shut down. What we need are people who are willing to feel this and to respond. As James Hillman said, “Outrage is a sure sign of a soul awake.”

"McKee: You call bringing grief and death out of the shadow our “sacred duty.” Why “sacred"? 

Weller: I mean it’s our moral obligation to stay engaged. A heart that does not somehow deal with grief turns hard and becomes unresponsive to the joys and sorrows of the world. Then our communities become cold; our children go unprotected; our environment can be pillaged for the good of the few. Only if we learn to grieve can we keep our hearts responsive and do the difficult work of restoring and repairing the world."

So much of this article rang true for me, in particular the sections about collective grieving. I had never considered that grieving had historically been a group experience, not a solitary one. 

2020 was a year full of immense sorrows. I have thought many times this year, "What do I DO about all of this?".  This article brought a new idea to the forefront: grieve. As the author says, "One of the most important things we can do right now in this culture is to grieve, because it is a protest against the collective agreement to turn our backs on what is happening...only if we learn to grieve can we keep our hearts responsive and do the difficult work of restoring and repairing the world." 

I had never considered the power of corporate, let alone grieving sorrow as a form of protest. But as I read the interview, I saw some promise in the idea. Perhaps the best way to return to joy this year would be to truly grieve the year that it has been. There were so many losses. Maybe we even do as the author does, create a grieving ritual that creates space for real change, for real joy.