Loss

Loss is a fact of life. Impermanence is everywhere we look. We lose loved ones. We lose our health. We lose our glasses. We lose our memory. We lose our money. We lose our keys. We lose our socks. We have to come to terms with this reality. How we deal with them is what makes all the difference. For it is not what happens to us that determines our character, but how we relate to what happens.

Lama Surya Das, Working with Loss

Losses

One of the more important things for our psychological health is how we have to cope with disappointment. Losses are present in our lives from infancy onwards. Indeed, as Winnicott reminds us, a certain amount of disappointment is necessary as infants in order to allow a secure sense of self to develop. The parent has to gently "disappoint" the child in order to allow the child develop the independence to take on certain tasks for itself, to face the world without relying totally on the parent. This allows the infant have the resilience for facing the ups and downs of this world, as well as understanding that there is nuance in every person, that we cannot expect anyone to perfectly satisfy all our needs.

If established well, the person can be comfortable on their own and have the space in later life to deal with the inevitable ways in which others let them down. If not, then one can struggle when a partner changes, a parent disillusions, a relationship goes sour or a job turns out to be unfulfilling, because one has looked to them to give life meaning. Another negative aspect could be that the child feels responsible for the loss and may pick up the mistaken idea that negative emotions are wrong, and to admit them is to show weakness or a lack of self-control.

Over the years all these losses add up. Some we have time to acknowledge, some not. Stephen Levine reminds us that grieving that has to go on for all the little losses and disappointments that happen throughout our days. He calls this "our ordinary, everyday grief" which builds up following the "disappointments and disillusionment, the loss of trust and confidence that follows the increasingly less satisfactory arch of our lives".

One thing we can do in response is try to avoid feeling this grief, by hardening our hearts or denying to ourselves that the loss had any real meaning. However, although this provides a momentary feeling of safety, it can either lead to a gradual deadening of our experience of the world or reappear in our unconscious as anxiety or repeating behaviours. A better option is to stay open to life and acknowledge its inevitable losses, even the little ones. Ultimately, being open to feel the fear of loss is the only way to integrate it. It’s also the only way to a genuine relationship with others, because closeness to others cannot be founded on neediness or on the fear of being alone. Before we can be in relationship with others, we need to be able to accept a certain type of aloneness in ourselves. If we do not see that we will always be disappointed in the things that we think will fill it.

The Gift

For my Father, buried this day, 1973.

Did someone say that there would be an end,
An end, Oh, an end, to love and mourning?
What has once been so interwoven cannot be raveled,
nor the gift ungiven.
Now the dead move through all of us still glowing....
What has been plaited cannot be unplaited -
only the strands grow richer with each loss
and memory makes kings and queens of us.
When all the birds have flow to some real haven,
we who find shelter in the warmth within,
Listen, and feel new-cherished, new-forgiven,
As the lost human voices speak through us
and blend our complex love,
Our mourning without end.

May Sexton, All Souls

A poem in memory of those who are no longer with us

For my Father, who died just before Christmas
and for all those whose passing we mark at this time.

Though we need to weep your loss,
You dwell in that safe place in our hearts,
Where no storm or might or pain can reach you.

We look towards each other no longer
From the old distance of our names;
Now you dwell inside the rhythm of breath,
As close to us as we are to ourselves.

Though we cannot see you with outward eyes,
We know our soul’s gaze is upon your face,
Smiling back at us from within everything
To which we bring our best refinement.

Let us not look for you only in memory,
Where we would grow lonely without you.
You would want us to find you in presence,
Beside us when beauty brightens,
When kindness glows
And music echoes eternal tones.

When orchids brighten the earth,
Darkest winter has turned to spring;
May this dark grief flower with hope
In every heart that loves you.

May you continue to inspire us:

To enter each day with a generous heart.
To serve the call of courage and love
Until we see your beautiful face again
In that land where there is no more separation,
Where all tears will be wiped from our mind,
And where we will never lose you again.

John O’Donohue

Let Go

Sometimes we notice that we put a lot of our hopes into how we wish people, career or situations should be. We often project onto others, or onto the future, all that we unconsciously want to experience or feel is lacking in our own lives at this moment. We can build up stories around things fixed in certain ways. However, life, no matter how much we would like it to be, is never fixed, not even briefly. It is always changing. It can let us down. These changes have a way of loosening projections, and this allows us, even in the midst of disappointment and desolation, to take responsibility for our own happiness.

We need to recognize, let go and move on. Recognize the need for happiness which has been placed onto the person, the event or the future development. Let go of the projections and the unconscious baggage we have placed on them. Move on, letting the past take care of itself and keeping ones focus on the present. The easiest starting point to work on this is to notice the tendency to want things to be different from what they are and to practice giving up that strong preference.

By letting it go it all gets done.
The world is won by those who let it go.
But when you try and try.
The world is beyond the winning.

Lao Tzu

Facing up to Loss

Traditionally, in the Christian yearly Calendar, November is the month for remembering those who have died.The roots of this tradition are probably found in the basic human awareness of the approach of winter and the shortening of the days. As well as reminding us of the impermanence of all things, including our health and life, it helps us reflect on the other losses which we face at times in our lives, such as when faced with change, or sickness or having to move. The most basic practice in these moments is to be aware of the feelings these losses provoke and not to run from them.

"On some basic yet very deep level all of us feel fundamentally alone, and until we face this directly, we will fear it. Most of us will do almost anything to avoid this fear. Many, when faced with the fear of aloneness, get extra busy, or try to find some other escape. Ultimately, however, the willingness to truly feel the fear of aloneness and loss is the only way to transcend it. It’s also the only way to develop intimacy with others, because genuine intimacy can’t be based on neediness or on the fear of being alone."

Ezra Bayda