Our hearts are simple … its purpose is to LOVE

Its our minds that often screw us over

Can love remain after a loss ?

I believe so

I think its our thoughts about what we’ve lost that can hold us in our pain and suffering for longer than necessary. But I also believe that this is a natural part of our grieving process and it should be privileged for what it is

Our hearts break open and cause us physical pain when a love is lost because it feels like we’ve lost a part of ourselves. Its the part of loving that often makes us decide never to be open to fall in love again, to give up on our dreams and to loose hope. Our hurts can temporarily shut us down for business and build walls around our hearts without us even realizing that its happened

Accepting and allowing the pain depends upon the type of love lost

Loosing a child is different to loosing an elderly parent. Loosing a lover is different to loosing a friend. Loosing a job is different to loosing a dream. Loosing our independence is different to loosing our home. Loosing our limb is different to loosing our memory. Every loss will be experienced differently for each and every person

But whatever the loss and who ever the person, the best way is to flow naturally through our grief, however messy it gets and however slowly we go

Choosing to stand in our truth, however uncomfortable it is to face

Choosing to remain open, however much we want to shut down

Choosing not to rely on someone else to fill the gap, however hard it is to confront alone

Choosing to love our selves, however challenging it is to heal our hearts

Unhealthy hearts suppress the process of grief to protect itself, but the hurt doesn’t go away until its fully expressed and released. It manifests in other areas of our lives. We may make different choices to avoid or seek love. Our behaviours may change so we can deny or invite love in. The kind of love we invite in may change. Our relationships may suffer. Our friendships may change. Our bodies may experience fatigue, pain, illness or disease and we may even eventually loose ourselves in the darkness

Sometimes this is a place we choose to be because there is something we are meant to find there. Sometimes we need to accept the help we need to find our way out. Sometimes we must fight hard to find the light and sometimes the light finds us. It doesn’t matter how our relationship with darkness begins. What matters is understanding its purpose

The darkness isn’t a place to fear because it IS a part of us. Its purpose is to make us a whole being of both light and dark. Neither being good nor bad, right nor wrong but both being just a state of what is

“I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there really is only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light” (Barbara Brown Taylor)

A healthy heart is not only full of rainbows and light, its not without pain or suffering

A healthy heart is open to feel whatever it feels

A healthy heart appreciates and flows with both love and loss without resistance

A GRATEFUL heart is a healthy heart that LOVES