Grief as an interim stage of Collapse Acceptance
Our grief is real and it is painful, but it need not last forever.
There's a model of grief that identifies "four tasks of mourning:"
Accept that the loss is real
Work through the painful emotions attending the loss
Adjust to a world where what you love is missing
Embark on the rest of your life, with a transformed relationship with what you love.
I think these "tasks" (from a therapist named William Worden) are helpful to describe part of our journey from collapse awareness to collapse acceptance. The simplest possible schematic is:
Awareness => Grief => Acceptance.
How do we get through that middle step? What does this model of grieving tell us?
1. Accept that the loss is real. Most of my readers believe the "bad news" about climate and society. Some people, as we know, have already lost everything; collapse has already happened for them. For those of us still waiting, we might think about what we stand to lose. Not only our homes, families, and careers, but our confidence that the future is safe, or even possible for us to live in. To lose our future self is a great loss!
2. Work through the painful emotions attending the loss. To express feelings and to feel empathetic reflection is the foundation of healing. The topic of collapse is sometimes "taboo" in normal society, and even in our families, which can make us feel isolated. Fortunately, there are numerous groups now where you can meet with people online to share your feelings about collapse, and be heard with sympathy.
3. Adjust to a world where what you love is missing. When a person dies, we miss our relationship with them and we miss the roles they played in our lives. When we think about collapse, what exactly will we miss? This is a challenging thought, because we are forced to imagine what the future may be, and then imagine the losses we will need to adjust to. A simple example would be planting a garden to supplement a vanished food supply. At a larger level, if collapse is widespread and severe, the changes may be so great that to adjust to them is practically impossible. When we contemplate the extinction of species, for example, we may end up missing the biosphere that supports human and other life. What kind of adjustment can we make to something so grandiose and terrible?
4. Embark on the rest of your life, with a transformed relationship with what you love. When we grieve the loss of a person, over time we can reincorporate the loving memory of them into our continuing life. Our love is not lost; it is transformed. In the case of collapse, we are losing the future, of ourselves and of the wider world. If we intend to embark on the rest of our lives in such a dire situation, we must transform our love for the world in a way that allows us to persevere. My best guess is that the leap to acceptance occurs when we let go of the future and discover that the current day is worthy of all our love. We can be complete in the here and now.
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Our grief is real and it is painful, but it need not last forever. Even in the face of the worst horrors, the human spirit can find connection with what is nourishing and powerful. We can make the journey to collapse acceptance if we accept what is real, express our emotions, make the adjustments that we can, and transform our love to find strength and courage in the present day.
🌎❤️⭐️
Adyashanti says "Let you heart break wide open." That's what it took for me to get past the grief.
I am not grieving this as a loss. I am fearful of what could replace it. But I have never seen much to celebrate in our culture. It is sick. If you are a minority or someone from a group that is oppressed I don't think the loss of this society is much of a loss. I see this as chance to introduce a new way of thinking about humanity, life, ecology and so much else. I grew up in poverty. It was not horrible to be impoverished. What was horrible was the reactions others had because you are impoverished. They despise you. They act like you will steal from them. They treat you as garbage. You learn to be invisible. You learn to read others minds. You learn to be what others want you to be to fit in. But you never really fit in. Your brain is altered from that trauma. Your brain is keener. You are aware in ways other never will be. So for me this is a chance to show others what they will go through and how to grow from it. How to become a better human being from it. How to possibly change the world for good. Human Kind may end. But the world will not and while I am still around I will love every moment it offers me and help others do the same.