Grieving as Heartful Yearnings of Love & Loss

Grief is expressing your deep love and gratitude for the Life of so many you care for and honour.

In the past your world would alienate grief as an individual experience with a pressure to “get over it” or “there is no time to grieve.”  In some situations, this pervasive cultural narrative means that grief is to be avoided or seen as a psychological disorder. The pressure to return to normal interrupts the time needed for your heart to adjust and find new ways of expressing the Love and the yearnings for what may no longer exist in life.

The current situation for Ukrainians and those who empathise with the distress and suffering makes grief and loss a complex issue. The Ukrainian experience of grief is characterised by its collective, continuous, and politicized nature, fundamentally differing from individual, discrete mourning. This dynamic involves navigating sustained psychological stress while actively participating in a national defence and cultural revival. Grief feels cumulative – if there is a single significant grief there is also a constant background state (acute or chronic stress) due to daily missile strikes, air raids, news of the front line and political manoeuvring. As well most become “stuck in survival mode,” leading to emotional numbness, burnout, apathy, and functioning on autopilot, which delays or disrupts the traditional grieving process. The also is the contextual losses, beyond the loss of life, grief encompasses the massive loss of homes, livelihoods, community structures, a sense of safety, and a predictable future.

A Warrior’s Grief. A warrior has an intimate relationship with death and hence warriors have a unique understanding, experience and acceptance of life, death and grief.