Collective Grief + Loss
The world has changed. We can feel it. Each one of us has experienced some form of loss. There is a wave of collective loss and grief which we have never before experienced. If we haven’t lost someone, we’ve lost something.
We are in the midst of another shift in the world and we are experiencing it collectively.
Loss
Many have lived through unexpected loss. Our lives hijacked: vacations, celebrations postponed; lost business, lost jobs; when someone died, we couldn’t gather as a group to honour them.
There is another loss that is visible in the unconscious collective field - the loss of dignity and integrity. This can come from racism, gender inequality, religious prejudice, microaggressions. Or the mountain of unexpressed losses we carry from betrayals, broken trust, lost opportunities, and so many other wounds...
There is a great deal of uncertainty about where we are and where we will be going in the future.
Grief
Grief is a natural process. A universal emotional response to the loss. Experiencing our grief can bring intense sadness, flood us with anger, despair, guilt, fear, shock, helplessness, numbness… many of us haven’t yet learned how to handle emotional pain.
Grief is emotionally complex and there are different kinds. There is a grief that arrives ahead of an impending loss to help prepare us for the change that is coming.
A loss of identity. We feel it when a loved one has a terminal illness, divorce, with a new job, moving to a new city, and from transformational work that is wanted and welcomed.
Aiming to protect ourselves from this pain, we can push away love, kindness, compassion leaving us alone and untrusting in life. We can feel strong resistance to our pain. If it’s too painful to allow and is subsequently ignored, it can shift and express itself in destructive ways in our body and life.
Naming
How do we work with the impact of the collective loss? Start by simply acknowledging the grief. Grief can provide a time to go within and find a way to recalibrate.
While grief remains unspoken, it blocks the flow.
Don’t compare or dismiss. It’s okay to allow ourselves to feel what we feel. We can’t work through the loss until we acknowledge, experience and understand it.
Give time and space to process. As we work through and allow ourselves to feel, grief heals naturally in its own time.
Healing in the Ancestor and Collective Fields
If each of us took responsibility for our individual healing and healing of our own ancestor lines, it would have a profound effect on healing the collective field. This is our collective work.
There is a blessing in the current global disruptions at work in the world. So much of the contamination that has been concealed beneath the surface is now emerging into the light to be presenced, met and healed - providing an opportunity for all of us. It may be that your contribution starts with your own personal healing journey.
As we heal, we gain the capacity to work at deeper levels with the ancestral and the collective fields. We attend to forgotten traumas and hidden suffering in need of healing and restoration.
We begin to see that we are one and all are connected. It is all beautifully, inextricably linked. We are united.
