Finding Your Light Through Grief: Internal Vs External Healing

Hello, Cadre family. I am hopeful, hopeful that I have my time zone changes correctly. And I'm gonna give you a quick look at my eyes so you can see that I'm here behind the dark ones. And I am calling in a little late. My apologies. I was driving my car and I'm in Los Angeles and pulling over on the side of the road. Like it might work in Minneapolis. Doesn't always work out in here in la. So I'm also hopeful that you'll be able to hear me. Hello, Sergio, if you can hear me okay, will you give me a heart or a thumbs up or something in the chat?

I am sitting outside, it's a little windy and I just want to make sure that it's not too much and if so, I'll try to adjust a little bit. And if we haven't held space together, my name is Jean Nicholls. I'm actually going to sit down because I think that will block the wind a little bit there. That might help. So my name is Jean Nicholls. I am calling in today from actually Hermosa Beach. A little wind. Okay, if it got better, let me know. Trying to block it a little here. I'm calling in from Hermosa Beach.

I flew out to California today. I'm going to see my family for a little bit this weekend. And I was driving my car and had to pull over as quickly as I could. This is the fastest place I could get to. So I'm going to adjust one more time. I'm in this little baby pocket that like blocking some of the wind. Okay, great. So here we are. So I am here, out here talking about grief and embracing your grief and healing internally and externally. Hello, everybody. Welcome, welcome. Thanks for joining. My apologies for being a little bit late.

So today in our conversation, really, I'm talking to us about that whole grieving process. And when I think about grief. Grief can come in many forms. It can come in the form of a loss, a loss of a person that you've loved, the loss of a relationship, someone who maybe has you guys have transitioned for whatever reasons. Could be a loss, excuse me, a loss of a job. There are many people who have worked at companies for a long time and make sure you get the sands off your blisters. And in working in those companies for a long period of time, if there is a layoff that happened, you could be the person that's left behind.

You could be the person that got let go. So grief can come in a variety of ways. You know, the grief that I'm talking about today, for me personally, is that grief of healing from loss. So I've lost my mom, I've lost my dad, my aunt, all within the last couple of years, my father in law. So people that are important in our lives that have transitioned and what I've discovered and what I'd love to learn from each of you, anybody that's dialing in or listening on replay, how do you process grief or transitions that seem to leave an open space, Transitions that seem to leave a void?

How do you process that? Are you someone who goes inside and pulls away from everybody, pulls away from the world? Or are you someone that dives in and starts talking to everybody around you right away? Or maybe there's a combination of both. So for me, my healing process in my journey, I typically kind of go inside a little bit. And over the last probably year and a half, I went inside after the loss of both my mom and dad. And they were both in their 80s. So my dad passed away of Alzheimer's, my mom simply of old age.

So I was very, very lucky to have them for so long. And that is not lost on me. But those transitions can be really hard. And I'm somebody who is adopted. And so, you know, we all have a different story, right? We all have something different about us that could make that transition harder or easier. And for me, it's interesting because it's only been recently that I started processing that I lost my parents as an adopted daughter. And I have a brother and he is not adopted. My brother is actually their born child and he's lovely and one of my all time favorite humans.

I love him dearly. I'm walking into the wind again, but I'm also trying to avoid people talking behind me. So what's interesting about my brother is that for him, you know, he lost his mom and dad. But for me, losing my parents and being adopted, they were the people that fought for me. They were the people that defended me when I would get picked on for not knowing my mom and dad. And they were always just there. And when I tried to find my birth mom, my adopted mom was excited because she wanted to share who I was to my birth mom.

And my dad got really protective and he wanted to keep me as his own. I was his daughter. And so, you know, in that loss and that transition, it was a really hard transition for me because I felt like I lost the only two people that really knew who I was. But that's not true. We have great people in our lives who've gotten to know us. But they were my start, right. They were the first that really believed in me and protected me. And so when I lost them, I went inside and I just felt like I didn't want to talk to everybody.

I wanted to go inside. But what I discovered this year is there's so much beauty and being able to grieve in community. And there are a lot of people that rely on me to be strong. There are a lot of people rely on me to be a leader in a company that I co own or with clients that I work with. And I'm an energy healer. So I do sound baths for people. So there are a lot of places that people have an expectation for me to be strong. And I didn't always feel strong, and I didn't know how to process that, that, or be vulnerable with that until I got vulnerable with it.

Right. There's always that point in time. So externally processing. I recently went to a mother's brunch, a mother daughter's brunch. And it was for daughters who lost their moms. And at first I was like, I don't want to go to this. I don't think it's for me. But I went and I cried. And I got to share my mom's story, but I got to hear about other daughters who lost their moms and what their stories were. And I realized that it was time. I realized it was time for me to be able to share externally, externally, process.

But I also realized it was time for me to create a space for other people who are grieving, to be able to be present and hold their grief as well and do that in community. So for me, with finding my own light, it's rediscovering a part of myself that I feel like I quieted. I didn't lose a part of me. I just quieted it for a while. I turned the volume down on her for a little while. Hi, Brittany. Welcome. And it's okay for us to internally process. It's okay for us to turn our volume down a little so that we can figure out what our volume up looks like now.

What does it look like better or different or just shifted? So when you think about grief and that internal, external process, my question for you and feel free to type into the chat, is where do you feel more comfortable? Do you feel more comfortable grieving inside or do you feel more comfortable grieving externally? Where is that for you? And maybe there's a both. Maybe it's a yes. And feel free to type in the chat. If you'd like. And if you can still hear me, that would be great too. I'm hopeful because I had to adjust because of people, so I'm hopeful.

But today, on this beautiful Friday, I feel very, very lucky. I am in California. I'm gonna spend some time with one of my nephews. I'm gonna see my brother. And it's interesting because with my brother, we don't often talk a lot about our grief. We don't talk about our processes. I know where he's at because of things that he hasn't said or things that he's done, which is pretty symbolic of how he's always shown up. For me, it's not always been about words. It's been about actions. So if I think about his love, language is a little bit more about actions than it is about anything else.

And that is where I can see where his grief is. But my challenge in this space that I'm in, where I'm ready to externally process a little bit more, is to see if he's willing to process with me. And maybe he is and maybe he's not, and there's no right or wrong. I think it would be. Personally, it would feel nice to go through it together. But also, at the same time, I respect that. We are each very different in our journeys. So today, just learning about finding our own light. Here are a couple of things that I've done, and maybe they'll work for you, too.

One, I found a community that I could talk to. Now I've lost jobs. I've gotten laid off from jobs. I'm a consultant in my very first consulting job. I wasn't ready for my contract to end because I didn't understand what that meant. And then I was sad because I wouldn't be with my team and this group of people that I fell in love with for a year and a half that became family, right? So I realized that every single time I've gone through something that's really hard, I kind of go inside. And people don't always understand that, but I just need to feel.

And when you feel. Feel everything, sometimes you don't want to have to share all the things that you feel internal. So for me, I go internal first, and then I do a few things. I try to lean into something to learn. I try to find something to read that I might associate with. I might journal a little bit more. So it's just understanding what that is you. And then the second thing that I did is I discovered, when I was ready, a Place that I could share, how I could share the celebration of my mom and dad.

What did that look like? Who is that with? How did I present them? How did I feel about presenting them? So I did that through some retreats that I decided to host in spaces that were important to my mom and dad. And I brought my mom and dad energy and my grief with them, with me to that, to those moments. So I'm a doer by trade, a self professed doer. And so I went internal to process first, I went external by doing next and then I went external last in allowing myself to heal and doing that in a community, community of other people who are also going through grief.

Because at that point I felt like I was ready enough to share, but I was also ready enough to hold space for other people as they shared too. And that part was important to me because when I don't feel like I can hold that space for others, I don't feel whole and I don't feel like I'm honoring myself, the individual, or even all the cool stuff. My mom and dad, Tommy so I'd love to learn from you. How do you process your grief? How do you process big transitions that create a void? What are your tips and tricks both internally and externally?

Share with all of us, because I find that in community we can spark a light in one another. We can rediscover our own light, not just by ourselves, but through the eyes of others, through their journey, or even through their laughter and joy. So on this beautiful Friday, as I mentioned, I'm out here in Hermosa Beach, California. Why this particular beach? It's not exactly where my brother lives, but it's the beach that I've been coming to since I was about 6 year old and gave me the keys to the car and I can drive.

So whenever I need to process anything, this is kind of the place that I come when I have the ability to or the opportunity to. Erin, thank you for joining us today. Sarah Jo, it was lovely to have you here. I hope the wind wasn't too bad even when I shifted. But mostly I'm just excited to be able to come in here every other week and share a little bit more about finding better balance in our grieving process internally, externally, and rediscovering ourselves along the way. Enjoy your Friday. Get outside and move, stretch and breathe.