Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, the Swiss American psychiatrist who pioneered the study of many near death experiences, authored numerous best-selling books, and taught about the five stages of grief, may not have known that mass balloon releases are illegal in several states, cities, and countries. Releasing balloons and sky lanterns could be considered illegal everywhere, because after all, it is simply littering. The United States that have laws against mass balloon releases are California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia. But this is beside the point.
As a graduate of the University of Zurich and the University of Colorado Boulder, she learned the deeper layers of life and the energy of the soul, by studying people in all stages of near-death as well as helping people cope after the death of their loved ones.
I have also spoken to people who have had near-death experiences, only to return to their current lives, never to be afraid of death again. But that is little consolation for the living left behind.
Even if you have read her books, or studied and written about this rather unpleasant subject, when death of a loved one arrives at your door, the often sudden and unexpected shock of it rocks your world.
The blanket of grief also covers the loss experienced in ending relationships, careers and employment endings, and change in identity. All of the stages of grief that apply to the death of a loved one also apply to unexpected major life alterations.
You have always been you ever since you were born. I thank God for you. Just because hard emotional times appear to hijack your life when unexpected change enters your reality, does not mean you are not worthy of living the best life you possibly can.
Life can seem as if you are just going through the motions, void or any meaning, and moving in a robotic way. This is part of the shock of the first stage of grief.
There is no escaping your emotions as you process grief. You may also find yourself going back and forth between stages, hopping over some, or thinking you are past a certain point, only to be thrown back a step or two by a simple smell of perfume or cologne, or the sound of a favorite song.
How is a heart to heal?
For adults who are grieving the loss of a loved one, you can also hold a candlelight ceremony, make a memory book, gather favorite recipes of the loved one, buy some of their favorite flowers to grace your home. This is done to help the heart acknowledge your loved one, and helps to transition bottomless grief into appreciation, honor, love, empathy, and understanding.
In sudden loss of jobs, know that your worth is not based on what you do. Your personal worth is based on who you are. You are worthy. Brainstorm new possibilities that breathe life into ideas. Try something new. Help out others in your situation. Volunteer. Stay active. Do not give up.
In loss of your personal identity, feeling undervalued in relationships, and in dramatic awareness of the change in your personal identity in relationship to others, find yourself blooming like the bud of a flower blossoms into a beautiful seemingly new creation, yet it is not really new. It has been you all the time. The loss of friends and those familiar around you are not what your self-esteem is built on. You are more than who and what people thought you were. You cannot be put into a box of other’s perceptions. Be yourself, regardless of color, race, gender, age, creed, or any other difference human beings can contrive in the separation and caste system agenda. You are a precious human life with no one else like you. Again, you are you, the beautiful soul you have always been
Why is understanding the life of the loved one who has transitioned important?
Before birth, families of souls decide to work together in order to learn the necessary life lessons here in this school of life. The vast experience any one person can have in one lifetime cannot possibly gain all the knowledge of trillions of other lifetimes. One lifetime simply is not enough time to learn and experience all there is to know. Lives lived focusing on greed and personal achievement at all costs, by the choices they make in their lives, may never know what it is to need or want for anything.
Perhaps one person needs to learn patience in adversity in order to learn how to be sympathetic rather than judgmental and quick to anger which unbalanced karma in that last life, or vice versa. There are as many reasons to incarnate here on earth as there are trillions of sparks of life that issued forth from Eternal Universal Life Energy’s Big Bang.
Notice, according to the laws of thermodynamics, that energy cannot be created nor ended, only changed. If energy cannot be created, then it is infinite, eternal. It helps to understand this rather arbitrary fact when healing from any form or stage of grief. While some in science point to the Big Bang as the working theory for the creation of everything, it is important to realize that energy always was.
If energy is infinite, as the laws of thermodynamics suggest, then the energy of the eternal souls of ourselves and our loved ones are also infinite. They may be physically gone from our present life, just know that they are not gone forever. This means the life of the soul of your loved one is still existing on the spiritual plane. If they have achieved perfection of all human thoughts, words, and actions, the energy of the soul, complete in all myriad experiences, will merge back into the I AM Presence of Itself.
Still, to assist you in the personal grieving process, during your candlelight ceremony, review your life as it intersects with the life of your loved one who has moved on.
What have you learned in your life thus far?
Can you see the life lessons you taught each other in this life?
Did love win?
Where are you at in the grieving process?
Knowing this information does not help the emotional pain. If only knowledge would take the pain away. But knowing how to cope with the loss, the emotional pain, can also make you feel self-empowered as opposed to feeling emotionally dead inside yourself.
While nothing you do can bring your loved one back, knowing that you can heal and the next steps to be on the lookout for can let you know what usually comes next.
In the meantime, transitioning from feeling helpless to feeling appreciation for their life lived, can be a balm to the emotional upheaval. Time never stands still. Know that there is a reason your loved one was in your life, and you were in your loved one’s life. This was no accident.
You can apply these emotional steps to every category of loss mentioned above. Deciding to not stay stuck is helpful.
Now is not forever. You may feel you dropped into a black hole. Trust the process the five stages of grief offer you. Make a plan. Allow yourself the two years it usually takes to adjust to major life upheavals.
Kubler-Ross has helped countless people by letting people not feel abandoned in their feelings. You are not alone. There is joy in your future, joy for new beginnings, joy in meeting new people, and joy in new opportunities. None of the joy coming your way in any way diminishes the experience of life you shared with the loved one who has passed, nor does this knowledge hurt your loved one on the other side. This loved one of yours is also continuing to experience the Eternal Universal Life of the soul, which cannot be snuffed out by the transitioning of the fleshly garment of life. You will get to see them again on the other side.
This also means that the present energy of your life is yet to transform into whatever you decide it to be. You are worthy. You are part of nature. You are energy changing with your awareness in appreciation for all those who have gone before you, and all who are yet to cross your path.
Grieving opens unexpected and often unwelcomed doors of empathy and understanding, and makes us realize that life is bigger, more exciting, and more dynamic than we might have first thought.
Namaste
UNIVERSAL WISDOM ENLIGHTENMENT™ LLC 