This story is about grief.
Perhaps you may resonate or identify.
My hope is that something in the story guides or assists you in some way.
Many years ago,
When I lost my mother,
I prayed for what to do with my grief.
I did therapy,
Slept,
Talked to the angels at hospice who volunteered their time to listen to me,
Spent time in improv classes to make me laugh my butt off.
But there was something missing.
Of course,
With grief,
It doesn't just go away.
It aches.
Then it lifts.
Then it finds an organ and causes aches and weird pains.
Then it shifts to another part of the body and you think you yourself are dying.
Then it numbs the body.
Then it releases through tears or anger.
Sometimes it dances out of you for a moment or sings itself a song.
It wakes you up,
Puts you to sleep,
Turns you upside down,
And pretty much tosses you out on the sidewalk on a cold winter's night.
And then something finds you.
Something that if you long for it,
Ask for it,
Pray for it,
Or just surrender to it,
Will come and scoop you up and hold you for a bit.
For me,
That came in the form of a chant.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
It found me and I found it.
And I chanted my voice into the words every day,
Every morning,
Noon,
And night because it was the one thing that helped me cross over.
It offered me a container to fall into when I had no place to go.
It gave shape to this feeling in my body.
It called the pain out of me and washed it,
Voiced it,
Cried it,
Loved it,
Nurtured it,
Grew it,
And birthed it into something completely new and different.
And day after day,
That new gave meaning to my life as a kind of inner knowing that I had something to share with others.
Really,
That was all that mattered to me.
That I had something to share with others because that too gave the grief a place to rest in the comfort of holding someone else in their grief.
So often,
Grief is being experienced in the body without a major loss in one's life,
But just because it's there.
It's alive and wondering,
Where do I go?
We don't have to lose someone to feel it.
It just exists and it truly wants to communicate,
You know,
Just like a character in a book or a movie.
It may even come in the form of severe anxiety.
For me,
I tried everything and for some reason that chant,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Did it.
It was simple and powerful.
I no longer use it,
But I believe it was entirely meant for me at that particular time to move through what I had to move through.
For those of you out there who are feeling grief from loss,
Or for no reason at all other than something hurts or is so anxious in you,
Maybe you too will love this chant.
Maybe you too will feel yourself come alive again and again.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
It's a chant you can find easily online,
And I encourage you to if it's something that calls to you.
