“We have to grieve. It is a duty like any other duty in life…Grief is seen as food for the psyche. Just as the body needs food, the psyche needs grief to maintain its own healthy balance.”
Malidoma Somé was the author of "The Healing Wisdom of Africa: Finding Life Purpose Through Nature, Ritual, and Community"
“We learn to compartmentalize our grief because expressing it in an unwelcoming place will only lead to more grief. We are taught that the people who are closest to us have no way of holding us when we fall apart. Yet we are born fully knowing how to grieve.”
Sobonfu Somé was the author of "The Spirit of Intimacy : Ancient African Teachings in the Ways of Relationships"
“The best decision is that all grief be turned into life-promoting grief-based beauty and usefulness. The willingness for violence-shattered soldiers to heal others makes their malady into medicine.”
Martin Prechtel is the author of "The Smell of Rain on Dust."
“If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again.”
Robin Wall Kimmerer is the author of Braiding Sweetgrass
“The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them. How much sorrow can I hold? That’s how much gratitude I can give. If I carry only grief, I’ll bend toward cynicism and despair. If I have only gratitude, I’ll become saccharine and won’t develop much compassion for other people’s suffering. Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible.”
Francis Weller is the author of The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief.