Grief: The By-product of Joy

The holidays are here, and so is the heightened emphasis on the “should”.

I should be happy, it’s the holidays.

This creates an emphasis on tradition over need and a pressure to maintain rather than honor. 

We are all experiencing loss in some way. Grief is like a predator lurking just under the surface. You forget it is there until a random moment of presence catapults it to the forefront, threatening to pull you under.

It has become incredibly clear to me that grief tends to surface when I have truly allowed myself to be present. I will be lost in the moment when suddenly and seemingly randomly, grief reminds me of my disease, causing me to wonder how many more joyful moments like this I will be gifted. This is not unique to me and my story. I think we all wonder this on a personal level when we permit ourselves to stop resisting the desire to simply be here now.

Grief is the by-product of truly living. It is a reminder of how precious and fleeting moments can be. It also forces us to sit in the discomforts of vulnerability. This can feel like pushing on a loose nerve, but if we truly embrace grief for its reason for surfacing, we can see it differently. You cannot love without it. It is a necessary emotion of the human experience if we truly dedicate ourselves to being present for it. 

What if we simply accepted that with joy comes grief, and let them both exist together? Maybe this will allow us to choose which one shines brighter.

The societal pressure to be anything but joyful around the holidays is a key reason why more than half of those who celebrate wish they could skip winter holidays altogether. In reality, the holidays are actually a time to feel it ALL more deeply. The love, joy, grief, and sadness.

My wish this holiday is that we realize our hold on expectation and let ourselves exist in the messy ways we are intended, however that may be. Let us embrace the jolt of joy and grief together, for there is truly no other way to simply be.