This is the fourth in a series of real-time reflections on endings, identity, uncertainty, and the slow work of becoming. In this one, I continue the conversation on grief—this time exploring how it keeps showing up even when the sorrow has quieted, and why staying with it still matters. —SH
What grief teaches us when we let it speak
I used to treat grief like a checkpoint. Something to push through so I could get back to being useful. But lately, I’ve started to realize it’s not a detour. It’s the actual road.
Grief doesn’t show up just to make us cry. It shows up to change us.
But here’s the thing—grief doesn’t always look like sorrow. Right now, I’m not walking around sad or weepy. The heavier grief—the kind I felt in the lead-up to The Orchard’s ending—has eased.
What I feel now is something else: frustration. Anger, even. Grief in a new costume.
Grief that things feel more limited than I imagined they’d be. That there are experiences I want to offer the people I love but can’t—at least not right now. That the vision I had for this season looks different than what’s in front of me.
That, too, is grief.
Grief is the evidence of love
That ache in your chest? That’s love, echoing in a new form. Grief is what love becomes when it has nowhere else to go.
But not all grief comes from love. Some grief comes from harm. From betrayal. From things that never should have happened in the first place. That, too, is grief. It’s your soul saying, this wasn’t right. And that grief deserves just as much space.
There is wisdom in the waiting
As an Enneagram 7, I’m wired to avoid pain—to reframe it, outrun it, spin it into something useful. My instinct is to jump to what’s next. To make it make sense. But grief doesn’t work that way. It won’t be rushed.
This part is brutal. Because we live in a world that wants us to move on. Spin it. Fix it. Post a takeaway.
But grief doesn’t care about your content calendar. It moves on its own schedule. Some days I feel like I’m making progress. Other days I just feel… blank. I’ve learned not to panic when the blank days come. They’re part of it too.
Sometimes I forget that grief shows up in strange ways. I notice it when I catch myself distracting or self-soothing in ways that don’t help. When I get angry too quickly. That’s usually my cue—something underneath needs to be named. Something is hurting.
If we don’t transform it, we transmit it
That line from Richard Rohr keeps chasing me: If we do not transform our pain, we will most assuredly transmit it.
I’ve seen this in myself. In the way I sometimes shut down. In the edge to my voice. In the temptation to distract instead of deal.
But when I let grief do its slow work, something shifts. I soften. I stop trying to prove something. I remember I’m human.
Grief doesn’t mean you’re broken
If you’re in it right now—don’t rush out.
Grief doesn’t mean you’ve failed. It doesn’t mean you’re weak. It means you’re awake to what mattered.
It means you loved.
It means you’re still loving.
And maybe—maybe—it means something new is already beginning to take root, right here in the soil of what was lost.
Really appreciate your honesty in these posts.