Let Go and Move On.

When my mother died she left behind a memento that was one of the most helpful items I've ever received. It was a note that read: "If you're reading this, it means I'm gone. Now get on with your life." That was so much like my momma --- practical, open and honest.

In a very real down-in-the-dirt sense that memento set me free from feeling like I was supposed to grieve the rest of my life. Death is as normal as birth, breathing, and eating. When someone we love dies, it's not personal. It's not something that we, exclusively, experience. It is, however, something that we tend to attach latent grief to. It gives us a reason to express the grief we all have hiding just below the surface of the psyche. But it's misdirected.

Because my mother gave me permission to move beyond grief, I sometimes look at others who grieve for years at the death of a parent or spouse and silently wish they had been given the same gift: "I'm gone. Get on with your life." "Get on  with living." Remaining in grief isn't a sign of loyalty. We have this idea that if we stop grieving that's evidence that we didn't care, that we didn't love. We have this idea that the greater the grief we feel or display the greater the proof of our love. It's simply not true. I know people who feel guilty because, for one reason or another, they haven't or don't visit the gravesite of a loved one. They heap guilt on top of grief. That's not healthy and this is one reason I choose to be cremated. I don't want those I leave behind,  once I move on, to feel the least bit of discomfort because they haven't gone to a plot of ground to pay their respects on a regular basis. I want them to let grief go, to move on and get on with living their own lives. We can't live in grief and joy at the same time. One is of ego, the other is of Spirit.

As I was writing this the thought came to mind, "Perhaps my mother has a message to you through me." If you're grieving the loss of someone you love there's a time for grieving but it's not the rest of your life. My mother may be saying to you, "After you've grieved a bit get on with your life. Get on with living. There's a lot of living to be done!"