The Wild Edge of Sorrow

In our culture, we may find ourselves amid those who have a less than optimal approach to challenging experiences.  “Get over it and move on”- or “go shopping and just forget about it” are two of the many common messages we may be given when confronting something challenging.  Or maybe your challenge is met with a cheerleading refrain of “You can do it- just pull yourself up by your bootstraps and overcome it.”  The dominant western culture does not have a language for responding to grief that encourages a healthy relationship to it and does not know how to allow it to find it’s own natural path to completion.  As a result of a multitude of losses that have not been adequately held, many of us are carrying layers of grief that may feel too much to bear- especially when we are trying to bear it alone.

Our culture emphasizes rugged independence; we are taught to go it alone.  Meanwhile, losses, large and small, accumulate unaccompanied and untended- skipped over and ignored. 

Focusing, as a method of deep embodied listening- lends itself perfectly to the healing art of grieving well.  Focusing helps us to tend to what has gone unnoticed- to discover what has gone unheard. Both treasures and tender places may emerge in this process with the result being an overall sense of greater aliveness and greater spaciousness.  What has been way too much, now accompanied, can become lighter and easier to bear.  What has been a burden may reveal some hidden treasures when we learn how to listen. What has been hiding in the shadows is generally grateful for the accompaniment of some open hearted listening to its experience. 

This 8 week course will provide an interactive and experiential opportunity to explore our own relationship to grief- going at our own pace and only where our beautiful, tough, tender, strong and broken hearts are wanting to go, including a full turning away if that is what the felt sense wants.  We will use tools that allow the felt sense to express itself through writing, movement and making  marks on the page along with more standard Focusing practices to allow for a richer and more nuanced exploration than words alone will allow.  Care will be taken in each session to create a safe container so that we can relax and be together in whatever ways feel just right at the time.