5 Fresh Tips to Help You Start Moving Forward in the Midst of Grief with Grief & Transitions Coach Sonja Harris
Learning how to move forward in the midst of grief can be overwhelming, but you’re not alone! Check out these 5 Fresh Tips to help you move forward in the midst of grief with Grief & Transitions Coach Sonja Harris.
Sonja is here to lend a caring hand and guide you through these life-changing transitions. Whether you're grappling with the loss of a loved one, the end of a relationship, or the search for a new sense of identity, she’s here to walk beside you. Together, you’ll navigate the complex emotions and challenges with courage, creativity, and intention so you can love life and find joy again.
As one of her clients says, “My life has improved greatly since I started coaching with Sonja. Since I first started coaching, I've found better ways to respond to relationship problems, I've bettered my career, and I've gotten much better at time management. Most importantly, I've gotten a lot better at setting boundaries with others. What I find most valuable about Sonja's coaching technique is that she doesn't expect you to just change who you are, and she doesn't suggest that you just stop seeing things a certain way. Instead, she shows you alternate routes you never would have considered before. You'd be surprised at how many gray areas we overlook when we are making decisions or when we find ourselves at crossroads. Sonja's coaching style makes it much easier to see those gray areas.”
You can learn more about Sonja Harris on her Fresh Starts profile.
5 Fresh Tips to help you move forward in the midst of grief:
Let go of what you think grief "should" look like. Society has some really unrealistic ideas about grief. Your friends may be asking you why you’re still sad. Perhaps your job gave you the standard 3 days’ bereavement leave and expected you to return as if nothing had happened. You feel judged by people who think you’re moving forward too fast or not fast enough. Someone has probably talked to you about the 5 stages of grief (which were never actually intended for grieving people) and wondered how you’re moving through them and when you’ll be back to ‘normal.’ Maybe you’ve judged yourself against all of these parameters. Grief is so much messier than that. Grief is also uniquely yours. Your loss is unique to you, so your grief is unique to you. However you’re going through it, so long as you’re not causing harm to yourself or others, is right for you. Be gentle with yourself, let go of your preconceived notions of what grief should look like, and trust that you'll get through this.
Face your grief head on. Don’t run from it. Grief is truly one of those experiences in life where the only way out is through, and if you don’t take the time to feel and process your grief now, it’ll catch up to you later. There’s something about feeling all of those difficult emotions fully and in the moment that allows them to dissipate, but if you try to avoid them, they are always there pressing in on you. Let yourself feel those emotions and then let them go.
Prioritize self care. Grief is so stressful and that stress wreaks havoc on your mental and physical health. Our bodies are like pressure cookers, and they need to regularly let off steam, so to speak, to keep that stress from continuing to build up in our bodies. So make a point to take care of yourself. I know it’s so hard right now, but do your best to eat well, get enough sleep, and get some exercise–even just a walk around the building during your lunch break. If you enjoy exercise, this is the time to lean into it. Devote time to a hobby. Meditate. Journal. Take a long, hot bath after the kids go to bed. Whatever it is that works for you, make a point to prioritize it and do it often during this time in your life. It’ll make everything else easier.
Make some small corner of your world uniquely yours. That could mean anything from repainting your bedroom to getting together with a special group of friends to pursuing a hobby…. The possibilities are endless. The point is to have some small part of your life that is only yours–where you can take off all the hats you wear and just be you. And then spend time there. (This works great in combination with self care.) Having a part of your life where you can step away from your grief and your responsibilities gives the true you a chance to reassert itself. New ideas and possibilities for your future will start coming to you, and you’ll start to see a new path forward for yourself.
Finally, take this opportunity while your life is turned upside down anyway to experiment with who you are and who you want to be going forward. By definition, you were a part of something before grief came into your life and that something helped shape you. Now, without that person or relationship or life’s work in your life, are you still the same person? There are always compromises in life. Do you even like the foods that were your spouse’s favorite? What about the TV shows you watched together? What were some of the hobbies you enjoyed before that career took up so much of your time that you let them go? Do you still enjoy them? What is something that you always wanted to try but never got around to it? This is the time to experiment on yourself. What do you still enjoy and what do you want to jettison? Figure out what you love and want to keep in your life and this will help you figure out who you want to be as you decide on your next chapter.