Making Your Own Grief Tracks
Texas was recently hit with a big ice/snow storm. We weren’t ready and we don’t know how to handle the white stuff. Which led to me googling “tips to driving in snow”. These were some of the top tips:
Slow down. Don’t try to rush.
Do all that you can to make others aware of where you are ie. use hazards and lights
Don’t follow in the tracks of previous drivers.
Now this last one seemed illogical to me. When I’m lost and confused, why would I not just follow someone else’s path? Apparently compressed snow is more dangerous, because it can get icy and puts you at risk of losing traction.
As I’ve grieved this last year from my divorce, I wanted so much to follow a set path in my grief. I looked at the way others grieved and at times thought, “I should be further along”, “they did 1, 2, 3 and it made this [enter assumption here] happen”, and “if only I grieved like they did”. When I had these thoughts, I was looking for ways to minimize my current feelings of grief. I also was more focused on the destination (getting to the other side of grief) than what really happened in the process. I was looking at someone’s grief tracks and not realizing that it was just part of the story.
Tracks in snow can tell you where one arrives to but it doesn’t always tell us what happened along the way. Unless you were witnessing the entire journey, you might not know that they stalled out along the way or new snow might cover up the tracks made by spinning on ice. Similarly, looking at someone else’s grief track might misrepresent their whole story. You might see another’s destination but compress their grief to the details you know or have seen. This is dangerous, because, it too, can tempt you to compress your grief and put you at risk of losing traction in your own grief.
No track through grief will be the same, not even with different events for the same person. So as you grieve consider these tips:
Slow down. Don’t try to rush grief. The only way through grief is to grieve.
Let others know where you are at in your grief process. Pick atleast one person to see into your real experience.
Don’t try and follow in another’s Grief Tracks. Each journey will be unique.
Friend, may you see others’ grief tracks and know you are not alone, but feel the freedom to make your own track for this is your time of grief.
So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.
John 16:22
Resources:
* In case you need driving advise like us Texans: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.huffpost.com/entry/how-to-drive-in-the-snowb9243152/amp