You lose a job, a husband, wife, child. There are gobs of suggestions on how to deal with these losses. I've written some myself. Some of these suggestions can be wonderful and powerful. I think however that sometimes out of these specific losses and sometimes out of nothing at all comes a non-specific grief. This is a grief that doesn't necessarily lend itself to "How to deal with the loss of a spouse." It can be at times an overwhelming and yet somehow vague feeling of loss that is incredibly hard to define. It is a grief that oftentimes we do learn to live with but it is like having a tiny bleeder somewhere deep in our body that is slowly sapping our life away.
Yes, losing that spouse or job is very real and there are issues to be dealt with concerning that loss and its implications. But many times something darker and deeper starts to get hold. Maybe it could be called the loss of possibility, or the loss of a dream or the the loss of feeling that we can make a difference. Maybe it could be called those things or maybe not. That's what makes it so difficult to deal with. It's hard to put this loss into words or thoughts. It becomes really an existential loss; something that reaches into the bone. Just being "positive" in the superficial way we love to say that word isn't going to get it done. Even though that superficial "positive attitude" term is sometimes actually annoying, within it does lie a grain of truth, a hint of what must happen. But because so many of us are enamored with the simplicity of just staying positive, we run from the work that must be done and the vulnerability that must be faced. I actually believe this non-specific grief can transcend individuals. It can become a group type of suffering, even a societal ailment.
This would be the point where I would start giving some great insights on what to do. I've got a PhD in Counseling. I've worked for years with people dealing with specific losses. I've
dealt with my own losses. But I'm sorry. I don't have nice pat answers. I do think that somewhere in this process of dealing with this non-specific grief we must explore Mystery. We must engage The Mystery. Instead of embracing simplistic solutions we must embrace the complex to find the simple. Perhaps we need to not look at this feeling as a problem but as a signpost. If we see it always as a problem we then look for solutions - specific, all embracing solutions. If we look at it as a signpost we go deeper into the woods to discover something that we just have a hint of, but something we know is critical to our spirit.
