Ways those who grieve are told to get over their grief

Without ever saying as much, there are hundreds of ways people tell someone who is grieving that they’re no longer interested in comforting them.  And people don’t get a leave-pass on this by assuming they’re not professionals.

Everyone has a role in giving comfort to the bereaved, because ultimately the bereaved are among our family and our friends.  And where comfort isn’t provided, especially when it is deprived of a person, the abuse of neglect is done.

Of course, everyone is allowed to grieve... for a while.  It seems everyone understands this.  That there is a certain limited allowance to bear sorrow for loss.

There is an unwritten limit on the heart that speaks of a mix of human impatience and the lack of tolerance for the inconvenient, and the ongoing nature of grief is the most inconvenient force in existence.

Few people tolerate the interminable nature of grief, so there is little wonder those who are grieving feel weak, guilty, selfish and hopeless for feeling what they cannot stop feeling.  Only those who have genuinely grieved comprehend that grief is a force that cannot be circumvented or stopped.

Ways people communicate they’re not interested in comforting the grieving person without saying as much include:

·               simply not asking how they’re going – this is a pointed refusal to enter into real dialogue with the person, and says, “Let’s keep things superficial”

·               keeping discussion ‘light’, because people think, “I don’t want to upset them”

·               changing the subject when they decide to open up – it’s amazing how skilful people become at doing this – it’s either to ‘cheer them up’ or “let’s talk about something more interesting”

·               spiritualising loss, for example, “God will bring something good out of this” and “God doesn’t want you to dwell in your sadness” – in other words, ‘get over it’

·               dissociative body language – souls know when souls turn from them in indifference, when there is interpersonal distance created – the more the grieving person discusses their grief, the more disinterested the other person becomes

·               impatient and angry behaviour – the words may not be uttered, but the person grieving is told by the aggressive behaviour that ‘enough is enough’

·               giving advice on how they can feel better – if someone is impatient and especially if they’re learned, the temptation is to intellectualise or pragmatise the grief

Instead of our languishing in avoidance,
we are far better off acknowledging the truth,
and being prepared to enter the discomfort,
because quite frankly, it isn’t that hard.

Grief, we should all know, is not about the mythical closure as much is it is about accepting the changes that ultimately occur.  To grieve is to enter a changing life that will never be the same again.

This, in and of itself, is an enormously challenging process, and one that is never achieved easily. It is always a struggle, and phenomenally a mount higher than any of us can perceive.

This is an arresting truth:

... the journey of grief does not promise ‘closure’,
as if that would achieve anything,
but it does promise to change us.

As comforters, we are often positioned as learners.  Those we sit with, the grievers, are our teachers.  Isn’t that a humbling prospect for pastors, counsellors, psychologists, social workers and the like?

The instruments of our lessons are God-given and only as we sit within surrender and attend the person in their grief do we gain access to the mysteries of the Holy Spirit’s teaching.

And here, in this, is the miracle.  By a mysterious process, teaching provides healing.  As we provide a ministry of being taught by the person grieving who is teaching us, the Holy Spirit begins the work of healing.

This is so all the glory goes to God, as it should, because if credit went to us, we would only become conceited.