Waves of Grief In this article I use the analogy of the ocean and its waves to help us understand grief and to move through it effectively. Having worked with grieving people throughout my career and having seen people struggle with the same questions about their grief, I attempted to locate an image that people could relate to and that was helpful. In a way, this analogy acts like a life buoy, giving us something tangible to grab a hold of when we feel out of our depth. I have found this comparison to ocean swell is always well received and really helps people to relax and move through their grief. I am a lover of the ocean, a swimmer and a surfer, and a few years back I became fascinated by those individuals who surf in extreme conditions, such as 60ft walls of water. I watched a number of documentaries, trying to understand how these people prepared themselves to undergo the intense physical and emotional process of coming off a wave of that size. I wondered if they were crazy or just stupid. I also admired their courage to go so far beyond the normal limits. It was around this time that I realized the parallel between ocean swells and our emotional life. Emotions have often been compared to water in their nature and I guess this is a natural extension of that analogy. As humans today, we live within a relatively safe and controlled environment. There is not much risk, unless we seek it out, and there are few things that bring us to experience the extreme ends of our emotional capacity. Grief is an experience that takes most people well beyond their comfort zone. You see for most of us, our daily lives unfold within a relatively small range of emotional responses. If we were talking about waves on the ocean, we would say the average swell would range from 0ft to 2ft, with the occasional 3-4ft peak. The exception to this rule is people who have lived through a significant trauma or who grew up in a chaotic or continuously intense family situation. It is as though these people are living life in a storm swell, where the average wave is 20ft high and it’s rough and choppy with lots of cross currents. When significant grief comes (and you will know when it comes) it is as though the normally calm and serene emotional ocean turns into a violent storm swell, and most of us are not prepared in any way for this change of inner environment. Our normal and instantaneous reaction in the face of such extreme conditions is to feel afraid and to panic, meaning we give in to our fear. When we panic, a variety of physical and cognitive responses occur: physically the heartbeat increases, breathing shallows, and muscles contract, making the body tense and rigid. Cognitively, there is fear of losing control or going crazy, and this is usually accompanied by a feeling of detachment, or un-reality. When I was investigating those crazy surfers, I learned that their natural response was also to feel afraid, but instead of panicking, they worked with their fear and learned how to get it under control so that they could survive the situation. Can you imagine how disastrous it would be if one of these individuals allowed themselves to panic as they came off a 60ft monster? Much like grief, a wave is simply a build up of energy that is trying to release itself. When the conditions are right to produce waves of that size, we are talking about a lot of intensely focused energy. There are ways to react when you are dealing with that kind of energy that make it more likely you will come out the other side unscathed. Grief is no different; it is a sudden build up of intense energy and emotion which simply wants to be released. Trying to hold it back is madness.  So how exactly do we survive the waves of grief?
When talking with grieving people, I ask them how they would survive if they were in the ocean and saw a rogue wave coming from which they could not get out of the way; they would be dumped and submerged for a period. The answers to this question are remarkably consistent and as you will see, these same responses are exactly what we need to deal with and survive the waves of grief. There is a degree of overlap between each point; this is a process and each step flows into the next: 1.Breathe – without exception, the first thing everyone says is that they would take a big deep breath, knowing that they were going to go under for an unknown amount of time. The importance of breath for creating calm, for bringing us back to our centre, for healing and for general well-being is widely known, and when dealing with grief, the simple act of breathing, sends a message to our brain which says, “we are okay, stay calm, it’s going to be alright”, reversing the panic reaction and giving you back a sense of control 2.Relax – people always say that they would try to relax their body and mind, knowing that if they are tense they are more likely to get hurt and winded (sudden loss of breath). This amounts to ‘getting the fear under control’ by knowing that your best chance of survival is not to resist the energy that is about to overwhelm you. 3.Surrender – knowing that the force of the wave (emotion) is more powerful than you, it makes no sense to resist it, so instead you choose to surrender, to relinquish your control temporarily to the greater force, to surrender to the feelings, allowing them to arise and take over. Another way to think about this is this: if we want to survive an energy that is stronger than us, the best way to do this is to become like that energy. If you are overthrown by a big wave, the smartest thing to do is act like water, become fluid, floppy, go with it, because that’ what is going to happen anyway, and if you remain rigid, you will simply get hurt. 4.Accept disorientation and unreality – in order not to panic in a situation like this, you need to accept a degree of cognitive disorientation. Again we need to relax into not knowing which way is up, to not feeling in contact with where our body is, and to not knowing when the wave will allow us to come back to the surface for air. In the ocean, as with grief, we can be suddenly thrust into an environment that is nothing like our usual environment. We have been plunged into another world which has very different rules than our own world. Accept this and try to work with these new rules. 5.Maintain internal compass – finding ourselves in a new world, we want to also attempt to maintain a sense of the where the familiar world is and how to get back to it. Underwater, we might feel the sandy bottom, or see light through the water which tells us which way is up. In grief, we might hear the phone ringing, or feel the chair beneath us, which reminds us that normal reality is still around, and this can help bring us back to it. 6.Resurfacing – grief comes and goes like waves, and between sets of waves, there are opportunities to catch your breath, before the next wave comes, or before the ocean becomes calm again. When submerged, keep looking for your opportunity to surface and take another breath. Mentally, it is essential to stay alert to this, and keep looking for an opportunity to resurface and not to give up. The opportunity will always come; emotions do have an end, they ebb and flow like waves. 7.Swim at patrolled beaches – if you want to look after your safety you will swim where there is support. It’s the same with grief. You don't have to go through it alone. It’s important to seek help to deal with strong grief feelings. Perhaps you know you are not the strongest swimmer, so you choose to have a regular counselling session so that you have support to release the waves of grief and to learn how to manage them. 8.Keep an eye on the shore – grief can be all consuming over extended periods of time, however, feelings of hope and humour are always there in the background. Humour is the lifejacket; hope the distant shoreline. You cannot force hope or humour at times of grief, but you can keep an eye out for their natural return and gravitate towards them, encourage and allow them when they arise. Namaste, Michelle Please do not copy or reproduce this article without permission of the author © |
