This is a guest post from Lisa Brandel, who writes about grief, healing, and personal growth.  Today, she expounds on the universal concepts of Shiva, and what it can teach the rest of us.

 

I am expanding the concept of grief (change) being a time of

separation, using Roy Ackerman’s post about sitting shiva. I want also to bring another one of the elements into this as well, that is the aspect of self-denial, and then the physical aspect of slowly re-joining. Then, I hope to bring it all around to a place where I can offer you a way to sit your own shiva, so perhaps it can help you grieve and heal.

I seriously could write a book about this, and at some point may, it is hard to convey to you all the importance I see in this and how helpful I believe it can be in under 500 words a post 😉
Down through our human history, self-denial was a part, a very big part of our rites of passage and rituals. It adds an element, which adds to our FOCUS…and focus is the key to any ritual we perform. Whether you have experienced this in a religious setting, or not, you probably know someone who has had some kind of denial ritual before some major event in their life. It was self imposed, and may have seemed superstitious to you, but the core of what they were doing was using planned physical steps to create a mental state where they could achieve the task at hand.

I once knew a fighter pilot, who before he went on a mission, denied himself sugar and meat. Then when he got into his cockpit did a ritual check of all his instrumentation, and before he took off he placed the two medallions he wore around his neck between his teeth and bit down. He attributed his success to this ritual, and it probably was, because he did physical actions to create the mental focus, which made him alert.

In Shiva we see this kind of focus, we deny ourselves certain things, such as looking in the mirror, going to the theater, listening to music, and so on and so forth.

In our modern day grieving, we don’t think about denial actually being a tool for focus and healing, because our focus is on “getting back to normal” as quickly as possible. To me, that is the insane, when an entire life changes through any kind of loss it really isn’t an event, it IS a journey to discovery. The emphasis then should be, starting from the ground zero where you lost, and walking step at a time back into the new normal that will be whatever life you make.

Once we have mastered separation and denial, we need to consider the rituals in Shiva of rejoining. They are symbolic, and incremental. The walking around the block with your friends is amazing to me in it’s symbolism for this.

Again, it is an event shared by the community, a show that it is another step toward rejoining. It also gives the community a chance to be there, to support the journey, and visually focus on the people in grief.

With that last point, I’ve shared in an abbreviated way, some of the points of shiva that work (can work)for us in healing.

So, what does this have to do with you? You may or may not be Jewish, or believe in something at all, so what value does understanding a religious/spiritual ritual have?
As I pointed out there are some very strong psychological factors involved in the ritual of it. Factors that in our fast food mentality are completely lost in the modern day homogenized societies.

The change/loss is thrust in our laps, and then we leave the space where it happened, and given little or in some cases no time to process, focus, deal, and heal.

That concept takes the power out of your hands, and places it in the expectations of people who have no focus on you, or what has happened. They act, think, and behave in ways that express their grief over the matter, but not always what is in the best interests of the person or people most affected by it are.

It really doesn’t matter what the world thinks of you, at the end of your life, no one else but you will stand in judgement of you and how you lived your life. You will be the one looking back, and in this healing we can begin to be able to look back on a life explored, and lived in more abundance because we have grieved and found the strength within to heal.
As last thought before I let us all go back to our day…This journey you take, it is yours, and yours alone. Only you can deny yourself healing by letting people who don’t have to deal with the consequences make your choices for you. The positive note is, that it truly is never too late to make a fresh start.

Let’s begin to get our focus…

Lisa Brandel is a fine artist whose art can be found here and here,  among others.  She is active in various groups, promoting the betterment of this world.  Cancer, Charity, you name it.   You could do worse than have a piece of her art hanging in your home.  I’m honored to have one in mine.

You can follow Lisa Brandel via twitter, @Widows_Lady302