Despair is so difficult to heal from because often people are not comfortable admitting to themselves or to their social, spiritual, and mental support systems that they’re feeling it in the first place. The first step must be to acknowledge it in a public space.
Our Times And Spaces Of Despair
It is said we live in despairing times. Despair comes in life, sometimes when we least expect it, always as a disrupter and a thing we most fear.
Despair can’t be fixed and is poorly managed, if at all. Despair blows function, wellbeing, and for sure, one’s “center”.
It Is A Cornerstone Of Grief
Despair, I’ve found in my work, is generally about the last thing people admit to feeling. It really is seen as the bottomless hole that I believe we still pretty staunchly refuse to address, because we so staunchly refuse to understand it.
It also happens to be the fourth – second last, actually – stage of grief, which is the foundational and core path of all mental-emotional healing. So how can we heal from despair?
We Can Only Heal From Despair When We Admit Denial
We must first be willing unconditionally to admit it is there – to acknowledge and accept it, understanding it only threatens us when we refuse to do so. We must also be willing, as it is a foundational part of the course of grief, to also admit the other, earlier stages – denial, bargaining, and anger.
We are still taught, actually, in our world, to deny all of this, speaking of denial. So we stay stuck and act out against grief and its presenting stages, which keeps us stuck and “swinging” between the first two.
The Transformational Gifts Of Despair
Here are some of the real gifts despair offers:
1. Profound letting go and letting be
2. Admitting what is really happening involving loss that is its own “bottomless hole” – takes away whatever was lost and there before.
3. Admitting one’s own powerlessness and hopelessness in the face of the loss as a “limbo” state of being, which suspends belief systems, expectations, conditioned agendas and delusions.
4. Being in the full space of experiencing loss without “qualifiers” honors and recovers one’s core feelings and the meaning of the loss, which returns us to the infinite spiritual source and available power that comes from being fully present.
5. Through experiencing despair to wherever its space of resolution and completion is, one grows and more greatly understands the meaning of suffering; and accepts it as a given part of human experience, which brings greater compassion and insight for self and others.
A Healing Journey Of Release And Transcendence
Now for the healing process:
*Settle back, as close your eyes and allow your breath to deepen and become more even, into a deeper meditative and reflective state.
*Now focus in turn on each of the above 5 steps, imagining yourself “diving in” to each one and experiencing whatever happens as an inner journey that you allow to unfold and bring you to a place that feels like a place of completion for now.
*As this occurs with each step, record and/or draw your impressions, as well as describe your inner journey.
*When you’re all done, read through everything and record any additional insights which occur.
*Then title your journaling, “My Healing Journey Through Despair”; and review it all once more, as you consider how this has been revealed.
*Note how you feel, and any additional thoughts.
In love and light, Marjorie