Creative Life Midwife

Inspiring Artistic Rebirth

Grief & Belonging: 31 Days of (Self) Belonging

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Belonging in Grief: Grief is among the most difficult periods of life. We often shy away from talking about grief or death because our culture has norms that are more accepting of thriving, health and youth than “failing”, not being well and aging.

This is exactly what makes belonging within the context of grieving so difficult.

My mother died in mid-August and my grief has only just begun – and complications due to feelings of not belonging have made it even more difficult than it might have been. 

There are times when grieving helps create more belonging. From an unlikely source today, The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg, we read about NFL Football coach Tony Dungy, who built his team to be successful from having habits to help them win. When Dungy’s 18-year-old son died from suicide, the team became a space of belonging and used that longing to triumph.

This is a bittersweet story. 

Then there are the words of meditation teacher Tara Brach who writes, “A sacred space of true belonging allows us to thrive. We feel seen, understood and valued. We are free, safe and held in love. In this place of true belonging, we have some protection of the darkness found in our world.

“We feel deep grief when this sacred place of true belonging is severed.”

Claire Bidwell Smith, in her book “Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief” discusses “Designing Your Own Resilience Plan” which is easiest in the company of at least one understanding, trusting person with whom you share a feeling of belonging. Use the planning to attract more people who may become your circle of belonging during this challenging time,

Start with one person, baby steps, and allow yourself the room to go slowly. 

You may have a team or organization, a church, a club who may gather to support you in a larger way like the Indianapolis Colts did. You may prefer your experience of belonging to be quiet during your experience.

If you love someone who is grieving, overcome your discomfort in small steps, too. The best step is by letting them know you care about them enough to be uncomfortable. Offer several choices for your friend to choose how to be supported: “Would you like to drive through Starbucks with me or would you like me to drop off a coffee?” might work for some people.

Grief and Belonging don’t naturally seem like they are likely to intersect and it is critical to cultivate belonging after a loss, whether you are the person who is grieving or if you care about the person who is grieving.

This barely scratches the surface AND I think it is important to bring up and talk about, together.

What are your initial thoughts?

Julie JordanScott is a Creative Life Coach, an award-winning storyteller, actor and poet whose photos and mixed media art graces the walls of collectors across the United States. Her writing has appeared on the New York Times Best Sellers List, the Amazon best sellers list and on American Greetings Holiday cards (and other greeting cards). She currently lives in a manse in Sussex, NJ, where she has recently finished her most recent book project, hugging trees daily and enjoys having random inspirational conversations with strangers.

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Stopping the Slide Into Feeling Worse

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Yesterday I felt the familiar slide into the blues – and I am using that term loosely. I don’t want to say I felt the well worn path toward a downward depressive spiral though that would be accurate, too. 

I don’t want to give depression that power.

I asked myself a personal power question:

“What can I do tomorrow morning to keep myself moving toward feeling-better-than-right-now?”

I didn’t mean take on something huge like walk five miles at a top speed or similar physical feat, I simply knew myself well enough that the tilting down of the weight of the blues  could land me flat on my face in mud or dust or worse.  I knew I single-handedly possess the ability to take an action in the direction of better.

I have the capacity to choose to move forward, with love – or lurch toward the ground in despair.

This isn’t always true – I was on the edge of a breaking point.

Mental health has plagued me over the years. My optimism tends to confuse people who don’t understand how this goofy, happy go-lucky whistling, happy song-singing, tree-hugging poet can shut herself off from others for no obvious reason.

This morning as I started a focus-mate session, I was surprised by the flat affect that still hovered within me. I am grateful I witnessed it – as the short-fix feel better medicine of taking action: walking on the nearby wood-duck trail and hugging an old oak tree is the beginning of feeling better, not the finish line to feeling better.

When the focus mate session was over, I mentioned to my partner I couldn’t find my spotify off button and was concerned my “Cozy Christmas Instrumental” playlist might be a bit much. On the contrary, my focus mate partner loved it. We both ended the session smiling. I know I was smiling.

Human connection, acceptance and cozy instrumentals all make me feel better.

Have you ever taken the time to notice what lifts you up when you feel the blues sweeping into the room?

Do you or does anyone you love experience dark days (or longer days that stretch to weeks, months or more?)

It is important we normalize these moments of sadness and don’t shame ourselves or others or pretend them away. 

You could choose to start a conversation by asking about it: “What might make you feel better?” and be prepared for “Nothing” or “I don’t know.”

Besides tree hugging and walking by myself or writing, having other people simply be with me is a big help. Talking isn’t necessary, but presence feels really good. Listening to or watching TV, reading books side-by-side. Silently sipping tea and looking out the window, all are better with someone beside me – also quiet without pushing me to feel better so that they may feel better, too.

James Clear wrote, “Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.” While I agree with the energy and meaning of this quote, I look at it more like every action I choose to take builds self-trust and provides evidence I am worthy of continuing to move forward, with love and do the creative work I was put here to do.

Today, I am feeling better. I am not dancing on the rooftops gleefully and I am mindfully present to my circumstances. There is no hyperbole, no numbing out and no racing throughts.

It could have so easily slid into much worse.

Julie JordanScott is a multipassionate creative who delights in inviting others into their own fullhearted, artistic experience via her creativity coaching individually or in groups, courses and workshops. To receive inspiring content and videos weekly and find out more about Coaching, Courses, Challenges and what’s going on in the Creative Life Midwife world? Subscribe here:

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Like a Beloved Fairy Tale, I Banish You: Scary Darkness & Welcome Light-Dark-Love

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“Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.”

August Wilson

I’ve had some huge breakthroughs for the, well, the last week has been exceptional but really since the new year started.

I have been practicing taking a stand for myself in ways I never would before and now…. it really is like that old affirmation I would say (and not believe) says “Every day in every way, better and better and better” in the past I would have said “except for me”.

The same spirits who encouraged me to pursue theater just nudged me to say “especially me.” I normally would not have confessed this post script. It sounds pitiful and sophomoric.

Who am I to decide pitiful and sophomoric are destructive (negative, bad)?

Yesterday was February 9. The first day I was aware of every moment and was content, every moment. I was reflective and contemplative and not excrutiatingly sad.

This almost feels too good to be true.

This almost feels impossible.

And it is possible. And it is good. I ate chocolate cake with Emma as a stand in birthday cake and when the coffee was too hot to enjoy with my cake, I left a full cup there without blinking.

This feeling of contentment is quite a contrast to the more familiar sensations when I have felt sad and broken and unworthy.

I was sad and broken and I would have argued and offered evidence as to my unworthiness, offered proof given to me repeatedly by those in the know of what it means to be devalued, unwanted. For me the worst feeling of all was unblessed, passed over, one the others have given up on or left behind.

Marlena didn’t die because I deserved to be punished, she just died. The facts are the umbilical cord which was designed to bring her life at some point got tangled up and stopped offering her life.

I didn’t do anything wrong, I didn’t deserve to be flogged or diminished. There was nothing I could do to change this and even though I could say this in the early aftermath, in the years later I myself got tangled into the web of “Well, if it wasn’t me than why did it have to happen to me?”

Sometime between January 1 and now I have been able to surrender my perceived punishment as well as this idea of Marlena’s death happening “to me.”

It happened. It is tragic. It is epic. It has influenced nearly everything in my life in some way since then. I have been successful at some tasks and projects since then and I’ve had some failures. Other people right here in this world have the same track record with completely different circumstances.

Yesterday, my daughter who never lived outside my womb was able to release her blessing to me because I finally opened my arms fully to receive it.

Her life, even lived only in my womb, was and is and will continue to be significant.

I have been so angry with myself, so unwilling to forgive myself for something I couldn’t impact. It was like feeling the need to take responsibility for my blue eyes or responsibility for my nose being the shape it is.

I wasn’t able to speak the anger for a variety of reasons – being afraid of anger, not knowing how to be constructive with anger, distrusting anger, not knowing the language of anger – and more.

The thing is – in working to rewrite my narrative and reframe my life experiences not into positives but into meaning that goes beyond good and bad or positive and negative – my life feels better. More aligned, more awake and alive – better than it was before “this crash” or “that crisis” or “that great celebration” or what any labels call it forth.

This transformation is in that “it is” category and it is more than that. More. It is more like “it is love.”

This is why I am going to devote myself to the daily spiritual practice of writing and “reporting in” because I know there is great value in that, both for me and for those of you seeking to rewrite your narratives, too, and fall back in love with your lives.

One paragraph, one photo-taken, one sketch, one poem read, one play experienced, one conversation, one new place discovered at a time we fall back in love with our lives.

I’m so grateful you are here.

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming soon!

Contact Julie now to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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