sense of reality returns, and it is uncomfortable. It is what it is—significant loss—and there is nothing we can do about it.
ACCEPTANCE
Eventually we come to terms with what is. We reach a place of realizing we can go on, though differently than before—possibilities of a new way of living begin to open up. Joan lost her seventeen-year-old son when a drunk teen in an SUV barreling downhill hit his turning car broadside. When she and I met serendipitously, she shared how her world went black for what felt like forever after her son's tragic death. She continued to feel angry with the driver, who was unhurt in the accident, and
I knew my life was over and I expected to live forever in a world of blackened death like a completely burnt forest . . . and then out of the blue when I wasn't considering it a possibility, a single blade of grass grew up in the middle of the burnt nothingness. I wanted my son back instead of a new life, but without my permission life took over and I began to live again.
Joan eventually adopted a thirteen-year-old girl from Mexico, and though she did not forget her love for her son, she was reborn. In the same way Nature naturally heals a burned forest, emotional recovery has an organic life of its own. We are designed to thrive.
One of the ways healing works through us is in layers of memory. Even when we have completed the grieving process, deeper levels of sadness and grief may appear years later, triggered by some reminder or similar situation. These are fortuitous times because they bring what was buried and unconscious into view and allow for release. Deeper pain becomes accessible because we have cleared what was there, and now we're ready for another level of lightening the sorrow.
Several months ago, my husband had back surgery. As I sat in the hospital, I became acutely aware of my last experience in a surgery waiting room. It was in 2000, and my dad was having knee-replacement surgery. He suffered a serious stroke the day after surgery and eventually passed away without leaving the hospital. These memories came flooding in as I waited to hear from the doctor. Up came deep feelings of sadness, and I started to cry. Acknowledging and remembering provided a powerful release. As I wrote down my feelings, the sadness gradually dissipated, and I felt clearer and lighter than before.
Receiving the Gift of Old Feelings
Whenever old feelings show up, no matter how old, you have an opportunity to dissolve previously dammed emotion. Instead of thinking you ought to be done with those feelings or that something must be wrong, treat them as dams that you are now strong enough to remove. They offer a door to deeper healing and greater emotional freedom and intelligence.
The RIM processes you will learn about in this book act as a catalyst to bring stuck emotion forward into your conscious awareness so you can set it free to expire naturally, allowing your inherently comfortable self to live again.
As one example, Julie had lost her twenty-five-year-old son Jacob in a skydiving accident fifteen years before she came to see me, and she had been suffering severely ever since. Jacob was her only child, and she and his father had already been divorced for years when Jacob died. Though she was a psychiatric nurse specialist, losing him abruptly created a dam of chronic depression in her. It was like her lifeblood had been sucked out at the time of his death and never returned, that is, until she connected with Jacob through imagination. With eyes closed and his imaginary form before her, she sobbed and shared out loud how she felt she must have done something wrong for this to happen and how sorry she was. Through imagination, she began to hear him lovingly respond—“You didn't do anything wrong Mom; it was just my time. I love you and I always will.” In that experience, Julie regained her loving connection with Jacob. She could finally remember him without feeling extreme guilt and grief. Now that she was no longer punishing herself, organic healing spontaneously occurred and she could feel joy once again.
Similarly, sixty-year-old Ted was stuck in denial two years after he was released from his job. He could not believe his employers had let him go. After all, he was a loyal and committed worker. How could this happen? Stuck in his denial, Ted was unable to find an equal position and was just getting by in a sales job with less than stellar results.
As he relaxed into his body, he saw he was fooling himself. He was fired when he had slacked off at the job because he was tired and wanted to retire, but couldn't because he needed the income. As he opened up to this inner conflict consciously during a series of three sessions, Ted realized he was wishing for something that was no longer available. Living in the past was stopping him from realistically pursuing the new job he still needed at a similar or better professional level.
Moving through his denial allowed Ted to progress through the stages of loss to acceptance almost instantly. As this realization registered in his mind and body, he got it! His interest in his current sales job changed dramatically, and he began to excel. His results and his confidence significantly improved so that he no longer wanted to retire.
At the end of an interview for a documentary, the interviewer asked: “Can I ask you a personal question? I have experienced a trauma, and I feel it is still influencing me. I can feel it right here in my chest like a ball. Is it possible for it to go away?” The tenderness in his vulnerable, young voice was touching.
“Yes, definitely,” I replied, “I've witnessed thousands of people release traumatic pain. Your spirit is greater than any human experience you've had.”
He broke into a big smile and his countenance transformed from tentative and anxious to light and free. It was so obvious, I asked his interview partner if she noticed anything different. When he turned to face her, she looked completely surprised and said, “Wow, you look happy.”
When I asked him what had changed, he said, “I have hope,” and smiled brightly and confidently. The mere shift of attention from fear to possibility can have remarkable results. Perspective is that powerful.
What sadness or grief is lingering in your body? A death, a rejection, a hurt of some kind? Close your eyes, and ask your imagination for a number between one and ten (with ten being the most) of how much sadness/grief is influencing you:
Move your attention into your heart, and notice a word pops into your mind of what pain remains and you get a sense of what it is. Write this word down so you can work with it further in the Practice It Yourself section below.
Envy and Jealousy
Feelings of envy are extremely difficult to acknowledge because they make us feel small-minded and less than we think we should be. Thus, we rarely share these feelings with others; they are our secrets. The reality is, there's always someone out there who is more successful and others who are less successful. These “more successful” people can find others who are “more so than they” and so on. It's an almost never-ending process.
The key is for us to recognize our feelings as feedback rather than something good or bad, so we can learn from them. Jealousy is frequently a projection of what we want and feel we can't have. Looking at them as something of a Rorschach test,9 we see in the people we envy a reflection of what is inside us that wants to express more fully. These people who inspire jealousy instead of admiration mirror a passionate purpose or inherent desire in us that wants to express in a bigger way.
At a social gathering, a woman shared how she couldn't figure out why she was feeling jealous of her friend who got a piano and was taking lessons. Finally, she realized she had always wanted
