Grieve Them In Order to Know Them

Activist, lawyer, and author, Valerie Kaur, is one of the voices I find myself turning to when I’m not sure what to make of my feelings or how to take the right action during political and humanitarian crises at home and abroad.

In this case, I’ve found myself wondering how useful my feelings of sadness and grief are at such an urgent moment for millions of innocent people in and around Ukraine.

In See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love, Kaur helps me see how grief can be a useful emotion that can lead to meaningful and sustained action. We survive grief when we name it and grieve with community. That’s when “the hole turns into a wound that can heal.”

Kaur explains that if we allow ourselves to experience it, speak it, and lend curiosity to it, our grief can lead us to ask important questions that make an otherwise overwhelming situation more approachable. It can also guide us to responses that are most authentic and fitting for us.

In her words,

“You may say: It’s too much – all this grief, all this violence and injustice, it’s too hard. You are right: The mind can comprehend one death, but it cannot comprehend thousands….Mother Teresa once said, “If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at the one, I will.” And so, begin with one. Can you choose one person to practice wondering about? Can you listen to the story they have to tell? If your fists tighten, or your heart beats fast, or if shame rises to your face, it’s ok. Breathe through it. Trust that you can. The heart is a muscle: The more you use it, the stronger it becomes….you don’t need to know people in order to grieve with them. You grieve with them in order to know them.”

To stay in the kind of grief that moves you to action takes strength and real heart. As you build your heart muscle, you will get better at sitting with your pain and the pain of others.

“If I can sit with their pain, I begin to ask: What do they need? Listening to more stories, learning about a community’s history, or showing up to vigils or marches or memorials gives me information for how to fight for them. I seek out organizations that are already fighting for them and offer my voice or time or money or labor to assist them. When I worry that I’m not enough, I ask myself: What is my sword and shield? How will I fight? What will I risk? When I get overwhelmed, I ask: What is my role in this moment? I remember that I have only to shine my light in my corner of the sky.”

Kaur reminds us that grief is the price of love. Grieving is neither passive nor weak.

So, let's continue to grieve together and actively. Let's find our "one" person or organization and arrive at our own right action to help others. Let’s not ignore our grief or let it swallow us whole.

In love and learning,

Molly