Grief is Like the Ocean

Sometimes it feels like you’re drowning, sometimes treading water, other times splashing about with your feet on the sand. Grief takes many forms and the image of an ocean is helpful when you realise that the ocean is in charge, and all you can do is learn to swim as best as possible.

That means accepting when it is calm, not fighting the waves when it is stormy and rough water, and waiting (treading water) when that’s the only thing that seems possible.

All of this means acknowledging you are in the Ocean of Grief in the first place. Which means acknowledging the death or loss of your loved one.

When you do that, you’re in effect saying ‘I’m bobbing about in the ocean now, I know from time to time I will feel the sand below my feet, and at other times be tossed about by the waves. But I also know that one day I will come to the shore and be able to walk on dry land once again.”  This may seem impossible, depending on where you are in the Ocean, but  as with a real ocean, there will be land to set foot upon, just as there will be calm, peaceful days as well as tempestuous and stormy ones.  Print this image to remind you that all you have to do is swim in the best way you can.