We know how tragedy, in general, can spur many people towards the spiritual path, and We have written about how an individual near-death experience (NDE) can awaken some people. But I haven’t spent too much time discussing the unique doorway that is losing a loved one, so I thought I’d spend some time talking about it today.
As I’ve mentioned before, tragedy is one of the way that life gets out attention in a big way. Suddenly, a lot of our unsaid illusions get shattered. In regards today’s topic, the tragedy could be the loss of a spouse, dear friend, a child, or someone else with whom you have had a significant connection. A hidden belief that this person would “always” be around gets exposed among many other things. In the instance of the death of a child, a powerful belief that a parent will out-live their children gets smashed to pieces. When a parent’s child who hasn’t come to adulthood returns to the spirit world, there are even more social beliefs that make the loss even harder.
In amidst that intensity, some times part of the ego breaks enough that light comes in. Some deeper illumination steps forward to show the person the truth and the love within them. Somehow, it’s like that connection with a loved one draws a person towards the source, and the truth and love from source ignites something inside. And you awaken.
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Grieving a Loved One as You Embrace the Truth
This doorway into awakening may not have any blissful experience when it comes after losing a loved one, or perhaps it does. If there are bliss experiences coming to you, those emotions and sensations may add some confusion to the grieving process. There may be this understanding that your loved one is not lost–that he or she has been found and brought home. And you may feel this intense joy that you can’t explain to anyone even as a part of you is deeply sad. Additionally, there may be parts of you opening to the truth and joy of this present moment. Somehow, your loved one helped to take away your illusions about the past and future. Through connection, grief, and/or some other aspects of the relationship, they dropped you firmly into the present moment. Now your eyes are opening.
While you may feel confused about what to feel, when grief comes, embrace it. The arising of spiritual awakening does not avoid anything. The grieving process is very natural, and the loss of someone significant to you is a powerful experience. Allow that power to wash through you. This is always an important part of grieving. Where people get stuck is in resisting the grief and holding onto beliefs that something shouldn’t have happened. But what’s happened has happened. Acceptance is key. Acceptance is the core of love and the center of spiritual transformation too. So don’t be afraid to grieve, but also don’t get lost in it. If you’ve awakened, however, it may be hard to get lost in sadness because of the clarity that comes, and it’s unconscious beliefs and illusions that tend to get us stuck in sadness.
Grieving a Lost Loved One
Embracing Joy as it Comes
When joy and revelation come, embrace them. This may be harder for some because of our beliefs around how a grieving time period may go. But some of you will sense the deeper truth. Some of you may even feel more connected to your loved one now because a spiritual awakening returns us to the truth that we are all interconnected. We are all one. So how could we ever lose one another?
We cannot.
Feeling this truth at this time of grieving can be more than a little startling for some of you. It’s enough to wrap your head around letting go of your dear one’s human form. If you are involved in dealing with wills and funerals, then you’ve probably got more than a full plate of things to do. I encourage you to find space to sit and be with yourself. You need time to integrate what you are discovering even as you are processing the release of the relationship you had. If you are organizing a lot of things, see if you can delegate some things to others to make that space.
During the passing of another, most people understand that you may need some extra time and support for yourself. I encourage you to take those offers of support. And when some of you may find yourself in unexpected joy, do your best to allow it. You are stepping towards the truth and the start of dissolving many other illusions and lies that have kept you trapped and dormant in your life–although you probably didn’t realize this.
Transitioning Your Life to Spiritual Truth
A spiritual awakening starts an amazing transformation, and depending on how it goes for you, you may realize that you need to change a lot of things. Some people may think this is part of the grieving process, and maybe you need to make the coming changes because of that too. But I would point you deeper inwards first. A spiritual awakening shows us the truth, and we may need some time to figure out what that even looks like and feels like. However, some things that need to change in your life will be obvious. When you discover those, take action. They will help you find the next steps in your spiritual transformation.
Spiritual Transformation and Seeking Spiritual Help for Your Process
Interestingly enough, you may find more social approval and support for changes that you may make since people will think this is something you need to do at this time of your life. Loss and tragedy have many interesting powers, and they can seem to open the doors of greater acceptance in other people for awhile. Where a lot of other people feel lots of resistance around change from friends and family when they awaken during good times, you may not have that same challenge, at least not at first. So whether it is going to a yoga workshop at a retreat center, moving to work closely with a spiritual teacher, or something else that calls to you, do it. These things don’t bring you closer to the truth per se–that is always within you. But they can offer important mirrors and support to reflect back what you need and help you heal what needs to be healed.
Eventually, people will see that you are making more permanent changes, and then some external resistance may arise. But when you start to understand awakening through the lens of death, a lot of these social beliefs about conforming to the ideas of others have far less hold over you. You may have already realized that those beliefs have nothing to do with life, death, and reality in general.
Finding Your Sanctuary
Dole have an article for you if you are interested about finding your sanctuary. The more powerful your spiritual awakening, the more important it is to find space to figure out who you are. Ironically, we live in these bodies our whole lives, but we often don’t know much about them. It’s like we jump in the car and start driving without ever looking at the manual or a map of the road ahead. In some ways, awakening is like having to read the car manual, look at the map, and dismantled and rebuild parts of the car. That can take a lot of energy, and depending on how soon that part arises for you, it may take up all your energy along with the grieving that you may need to do.
Thus, finding a space for yourself is important. Whether it is a room at a friend’s house, your own place, living at a spiritual center on a work-trade agreement, or something else, it’s important to make space to go inwards. In particular, it’s important to understand that a lot of the initial process is about falling apart. I call this part the dispelling the darkness phase, and it can last years. During this time, healing is front and center in our work, and this can be surprising for those of you who never had a trauma or another overtly difficult happen to you, except for maybe this recent death of a loved one. However, simple ideas like, “you need to be successful,” are deeply wounding. They teach us to not be ourselves, and we spend a great deal of time doing and believing things that cut us off from our true nature. Thus, healing is necessary to release this core wounding belief and many others.
The Shadow and Dispelling the Darkness Phase
Seeing Into the Spirit Realm
For some people, the death of a loved one doesn’t bring forth just an awakening. For some, they also start to see into the spirit realm. Below is a whole documentary of a man–Jonas Elrod–who awakened and suddenly a lot of psychic talents opened up. He could see spirits where before he could not, and as I recall, a loss of a dear friend was a key element in his spiritual awakening. You can learn more on the link below about his story.
As I said earlier, the connection to the passing of a loved one seems to draw people towards a deeper understanding of the spiritual realm. It’s like that beautiful connection you had–or perhaps it feels like you still have–has suddenly offered you some of the gifts that your loved one has now received in shedding physical form. But suddenly seeing spirits, auras, being able to astral project, sensing parts of the future, and/or other things can be startling too. In general, awakening to the truth, discovering psychic talents, and grieving the passing of a dear one is a lot! Go slowly. Take your time. There’s nothing to fear here, but you do need time to process all of this, hence my suggestion about finding a sanctuary.
In general, many people can awaken and discover psychic talents. Psychic abilities are like having a left hand. They’re always there. But somehow we learn to ignore parts of ourselves. Just imagine what it would be like if you had ignored having a left hand your whole life only to just discover it right now. You’d be shocked. Then you’d have to get used to using it, and then it would become normal. Seeing into the afterlife as well as other psychic talents are no different. The key thing is to not be afraid of what you now see and to get used to having these abilities more readily at your disposal.
Psychic Emergence and Spiritual Awakening
A Last Gift from your Loved one
If you have been graced to awaken after the passing of your loved one, then perhaps you can consider this to be a last gift from them. I am sure that they offered you soooo much during their life, and I am sure that your grief is powerful. But through their death, you have been uniquely offered a new opportunity to live. You have been given a chance to be reborn. That means your old unconscious ego is now starting to die. This ego death is the doorway to acceptance, healing, and spiritual growth, but it can definitely feel like too much at first. But who is feeling overwhelmed? It is the ego itself. So the initial part of a spiritual awakening can have this interesting problem where the part of us that is feeling overwhelmed is the cause for the overwhelm. The more you let go of your ego–your ideas about yourself and life–the easier things can flow, and your ego can die to this old way of living so that a new life can unfold in front of you.
Facing Your Ego’s Death
A spiritual awakening offers you the ability to find ways to live, feel, express, and love in ways that you might never have known otherwise. This arising is a gift among gifts, and if you can realize that, then you can honor the passing of your loved one by truly living.
Written by
DOLCE LIBERTA. More than a Bikini!
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