Guest Column: Living With Loss In Our Lives
When you think about it, our lives are filled with loss. From the severing of our umbilical cord to the final extinguishment of physical life, we are continually confronted with a series of losses which span our entire existence. Common among us is the loss of everything from competitions to our innocence, friends, parents, jobs, and financial resources. Don't get me wrong. I attempt not to add to the sense of deprivation many of us already feel as we experience these losses, but rather to attempt to provide some relief and palliative.
Since we know that loss is an integral part of living in the human world, should we not seek ways to experience them in a more balanced, healthy way? Should we not explore any opportunity to turn losses into gains? Or should we continue to let the stress of the subtractions to our lives dictate our emotional, mental, spiritual, and familial well-being?
I can tell you, from a deep personal perspective of having lost much in my own life, there is a great deal to be gained from gleaning the rich and sometimes profound treasures to be discovered in the nature of loss. I have experienced the demise of both parents, an uncle who was like a second dad to me, and my seventeen year old son to a murderer's bullet. I have lost jobs, homes, and even a career to the inevitability of age and its humble position in our society. I have lost no more or less than many, but I can say with all honesty that I have become a better and happier person from having learned the lessons precipitated by those events. My intent is to share with you some of those lessons learned and how they may benefit you as well.
"Wise men never sit and wail their loss, but cheerily seek how to redress their harms." ~ William Shakespeare
"The only world in which "defeat" exists as a reality is the one darkened by the false idea that what may have happened to us a moment ago is the same as what's possible for us to achieve now." ~ Guy Finley
"I am responsible. Although I may not be able to prevent the worst from happening, I am responsible for my attitude toward the misfortunes that darken life. Bad things do happen; how I respond to them defines my character and the quality of my life. I can choose to sit in perpetual sadness, immobilized by the gravity of my loss, or I can choose to rise from pain and treasure the most precious gift I have – life itself." ~ Walter Anderson
These famous (and otherwise) souls who speak so eloquently to the nature of loss and our responsibility of learning from it, all make one very profound point; How we deal with the loss in our lives determines the quality and character of our being. We are free to decide if loss will darken our perspective and potentially destroy us or whether it will be a catalyst for catharsis and healing. In a time of particular economic distress such as that we currently experience in our country, the fallout from the many losses precipitated by the high state of unemployment and the more covert loss of careers by many of the baby boomers makes this information especially relevant and important. Let us seek ways to adopt an attitude characterized by, as a good friend of mine was wont to say, "If life hands you a lemon, make lemonade."
Today we will address one of the most currently common maladies of our economy; loss of the sense of security. We all want to feel like we have at least some measure of safety in our lives, even if it is mostly illusion. Having a job, a roof over our heads, or a few dollars in the bank oftentimes provides us that sense of security. But as we all know, or at least those of us who have been around the block a few times; easy come, easy go. I don't mean to sound flippant but this well-worn cliché does characterize the uncertain "security" provided by the temporal nature of job and money.
I worked for over thirty years in the Information Technology sector, a once fertile ground for employment opportunities, only to have a wealth of experience and a deep and current skill set be insufficient for employment in an economy obsessed with cost cutting and cheap labor. Despite being a software professional who had moved swiftly through the ranks from software engineer to upper management, I found myself experiencing the loss of a job, my career, my sense of security and ability to provide for my family. Even when times were much better economically and employers competed for software talent of any persuasion or experience level, layoffs were not uncommon. And with my proclivity for inflicting political damage on myself, even a firing or two became part of my work history. And even though I would usually find suitable work eventually, I suffered from the same emotional/mental strain of my situation. I suffered, my family suffered, and my confidence rode out of town on the same avenue I took to the unemployment line. I had a family to feed, a mortgage to pay, and bills that threatened to overwhelm me.
The stress of those situations was, at first, extraordinary. One day, as I walked the increasingly familiar path around Waneka Lake in Lafayette, I pondered my options. I could continue to worry, stress myself out, and vent my frustration on my family or I could find a way to come to terms with the emotions and negative thinking that had, by now, overtaken me. I realized that my sense of security had been destroyed and that I could either continue to lament it or I could find a way to heal and refocus on something more certain and substantial than the loss of a job. Not to say that I quit sending out resumes and doing interviews, but I now realized the damage I was allowing the loss to inflict on myself and those I loved was far worse than the tangible consequences of unemployment. I knew that if I failed to heal my psyche and feelings, my marriage and family may not even survive until my next job.
On those daily strolls around the lake I sought the answers I knew were resident somewhere within me. I had, until I allowed stress to divert my attention, been a daily meditator. Over the course of many years, I had learned that we usually have our own answers, just as we also usually bore some (if not all) responsibility for our own troubles. I then began to spend some of those lonely times that had been initiated by my own sense of self-imposed isolation to meditate on my situation and my reactions to it. Quietly and often very subtlety, the answers came. We all know, intuitively if no other way, that there are no silver bullets, no universal cures for what ails us. We are restricted by our own limited perspectives and experience and thereby often precluded from detecting with our senses and conscious minds the best course of action for inner disturbances. Yet deep within us lives an innate wisdom that simply waits for us to request it. And when we do, we find that the best and oftentimes the most complete solutions reside within our own minds and souls.
I offer no silver bullet either but just a word of advice when you find yourself in similar circumstances. Look within and find not only the answers to such immediate issues as a temporary loss of security, but solutions for a better, richer, and happier life as well.
J. Michaels
Group Facilitation
Writer, Storyteller, Poet
Mr. Michaels will be co-facilitating a free drop-in support group at People House in Denver from 7pm until 9pm on Friday evenings. He will also be co-hosting a weekend workshop at People House on March 26 & 27. The topic of both events is "Thriving During Financial Hardship". For more information on support and workshops for those experiencing loss, email Mr. Michaels at j@jmichaelsbooks.biz
