When the Center Cannot Hold:

Grief and Grievous Challenges


"Mid-Winter Visitor" by Julie Danan

A bird sings not because it has an answer, but because it has a song.

We're never prepared when we're thrust suddenly into grief mode. Things fall apart, courage falters. Thinking clearly becomes impossible. We find ourselves among the walking wounded, and our numbers are legion.

"No one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear," wrote C.S. Lewis after his wife's death. "I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid…" It's a lonely path.

Current U.S. statistics cite increasing anxieties, mental health crises, and suicide rates across all ages and stages of life since the pandemic. That span of time was a grievous and disturbing disruption to life as we knew it. Given we were all somehow affected, and rather suddenly, the emotional fallout remains considerable as we ask ourselves what's next – and can we bear it?

A crucial step toward reintegration of mind, body and spirit is to take stock of reality and how our feelings impact our thoughts – and where to go from there. In acknowledging pain and its cause, we can take thoughtful steps toward recovery and wholeness through addressing our grief and feelings of helplessness. The path is difficult, though there's support available for it if we ask. A child can do it, but adults often struggle honoring the path and the time it takes to recover the lost parts of oneself. The part that trusts life, and one's own place in it.

Fred Rogers demonstrated the basics of processing grief to children in a profoundly simple manner that provides a good framework for discussion. In Mr. Roger's Neighborhood Episode 1101, an unpleasant surprise awaits him.

  • Upon entering his house, Mr. Rogers checks his fishtank and finds his goldfish laying still on the bottom. He moves it and tries to revive it with salt water, but it's dead.
  • He tenderly wraps it in a paper towel, and as he prepares to bury it, he mourns his loss. The occasion sadly reminds him about the beloved dog who died when he was a boy. He remembers how hard it was to say goodbye to him. As he relates his memory, he shares a photo of his dog.
  • Later, a friend stops by and helps Mr. Rogers create a marker for the fish's grave. Mr. Rogers sings a song for the children as he works: "Some things I just don't understand…" Its lyrics reflect no answers, instead relaying the importance of simply expressing even the most upsetting feelings. He reminds the children that everyone responds differently to sadness, and however they feel is exactly right.

Themes of this episode are explicit and simply expressed: sudden loss, the grief, the ever-present memories of past losses, anger mixed with sadness, fear of our own vulnerability. The helpfulness of neighborly presence and listening supports us in the effort to heal. The process of grief relies upon its honest expression, and it is greatly facilitated by navigating its depths with others who care and have suffered as well (who hasn't?) and made themselves available.

In 1968, Fred Rogers produced an episode after Robert F. Kennedy's assassination, knowing the questions the nation's children would have. That's back in the day when a single televised violent event cast a pall on the nation's daily life. Now consider the onslaught of violence to which youth (and we) are exposed today. Violence not only of action, but of words as well, as anyone with a screen knows. No wonder we have little time for grief. And yet – the price of ignorance is greater than ever. 

There are, of course, other kinds of grief besides that accompanying death. It comes in myriad forms: personal, familial, communal, national, generational. It exists as part of life itself. Though tempting to avoid in our "insane world," we neglect it at our peril.

Honoring the reality of grief and reflecting upon loss imparts lessons that can help us achieve and maintain the mind-body-spirit unity we seek. It's hard work picking up pieces of our shattered selves to rebuild in a changed life-landscape. Being a survivor isn't easy, and any wisdom that comes along on our search for inner wholeness is hard won. Experience is a brutal teacher, but we can learn a lot from it, including the art of resilience. We each have to figure out how to manage this for ourselves, and hopefully not alone. If we're fortunate we eventually come to the point where the sight or memory of pain still stings, but we've come to terms enough with it all to allow it to define us in some positive manner. At the very least, to take nothing for granted, which honors the truth of our vulnerability. It's not a bad way to live.

For myself, I think quite often of those who have died, some very recently, and left an impression on me. Some I knew well and loved; others I barely knew, a few not at all, but I sat with them at the time of death or read about them in a report of some kind. I am genuinely touched by departures. I try to do decent things in their memory. Silently within myself, I credit them for reminding me of all I value most in the world, time included. They remind me to make the most of it. 

It's as if the legacy of each of them is in the form of a song they would sing if they were here to sing it. When all is said and done, who would not want to be remembered in an act of goodness performed on their behalf, in their memory?

But as I said – everyone's path is personal. Finding ways to continue living in a purposeful, abundant way is a lifelong effort, because occasionally for each of us, things do fall apart and the center doesn't quite hold. Even so, as Mr. Rogers said: Look for the helpers.

These excellent resources also address themes relating to falling apart and coming back together again: