Soul's Code

Coming to terms with a loss draws down an enormous chunk of your psyche’s bandwidth. The death of a loved one is exhausting. You keep asking yourself what’s wrong with you because you’re staggering around as if you’ve been hit by a truck.

Your system is metabolizing the loss. Other forms of loss — betrayal, abandonment, down-sizing, divorce or even losing a part of yourself because of surgery — can come close to death in the energetic drain they exert.

This is the time to ground yourself in a single truth: the universe designed You to take care of a single entity and one entity only, yourself. You’ll never be tested more than at this time to let your energetic system do the work it was set up to do: taking care of yourself.

Your fatigue is commensurate with your loss. It’s the equivalent of a hundred hangovers.

1. Sleep it off — all you can, whether it happens to be 2:00 a.m., or 2:00 p.m.
2. They say a wise man eats whenever he’s hungry. Even though grief cuts your hunger, your system needs fuel to metabolize the life-change that comes with a life-loss.
3. Take as much time off work or your domestic responsibilities as possible. Blow out your annual vacation. Even though you feel weak, don’t feel shy about demanding — and taking — all of the bereavement leave that your company policy mandates. If you don’t have any of the above, request an unpaid leave.
4. Get by with a little help from you friends. When help is offered, take it – and tell people you need it. They’re not mind-readers, and are often confused about what to do. Nowhere is the power of networking, delegating and division of labor more urgent than in bearing the load of loss.
5. Cut your domestic workload in half: order take-out, a maid service and take your laundry to the neighborhood cleaner. Sure it’s costly. So is long-term illness or depression from mismanaged grief.
6. Remember to brush your teeth :)

Step 2: Re-orient Yourself