I'm not going to lie, I used to judge people. I used to think that a person should react a certain way when they lost someone or something that was important to them. I used to think you would have to let the pain consume you in order to correctly honor your lost loved one. It was my own experience in the past that when a friend or a family member died, I always seemed to lose a part of myself.

I realized in this last year that everyone grieves differently and sometimes you grieve differently even from loss to loss. I realized that you don’t necessarily need to lose your life and your joy after someone you love has passed. I also realized that you can experience not only sorrow and suffering, but a deeper gratitude and appreciation for life. That even though we grieve, we look forward and we no longer take life for granted. This is a gift from grief. A gift from our loved ones to us from a place of peace and greater understanding.

There are many kinds of losses and they don’t necessarily always end in death. Sometimes it’s the loss of a friendship or a loss of self worth. And other times the loss is very sudden and unexpected, leading to feelings of instability and discomfort. When the loss is sudden, your world will be shaken, and your very core beliefs may be shattered or challenged. You may become numb towards the world or angry or bitter. You may begin to fear more loss and feel a deeper mistrust with life and God. But this can be normal and you don’t need to feel ashamed or embarrassed.

Usually after a major loss, no matter what kind, there is a readjustment period that you will go through. At first you may experience depression, anger, and loneliness, but eventually you will regain your ground. The good news is that when we go through extreme challenges in life like loss, we are pushed to be more than we expected we could be. We become stronger and stronger through simply making it another day. We become less judgmental of others and their experiences and even their behaviors. We see past people’s reactions to their hearts and we begin to recognize pain in other people while then developing a deeper and deeper sense of compassion for them and even for ourselves. And as time passes, because time is the best healer, we will decide to cherish every moment and we will decide to trust again.

Through life’s obstacles and surprises, we reach within ourselves to find what matter’s most. We put aside things that are no longer important or no longer have a hold on us. We search out what is meaningful and we learn to love and forgive ourselves. Grief is never pleasant, but it is necessary and becomes our tool for recovery we never even knew we needed. Remember this when your grieving is painful.