21
" Come, my child," I said, trying to lead her away. " Wish good-bye to the poor hare, and come and look for blackberries." " Good-bye, poor hare!" Sylvie obediently repeated, looking over her shoulder at it as we turned away. And then, all in a moment, her self-command gave way. Pulling her hand out of mine, she ran back to where the dead hare was lying, and flung herself down at its side in such an agony of grief as I could hardly have believed possible in so young a child." Oh, my darling, my darling!" she moaned, over and over again. " And God meant your life to be so beautiful! "
24
" The soul, in its loneliness, hopes only for " salvation." And yet what is the burden of the Bible if not a sense of the mutuality of influence, rising out of an essential unity, among soul and body and community and world? These are all the works of God, and it is therefore the work of virtue to make or restore harmony among them. The world is certainly thought of as a place of spiritual trial, but it is also the confluence of soul and body, word and flesh, where thoughts must become deeds, where goodness must be enacted. This is the great meeting place, the narrow passage where spirit and flesh, word and world, pass into each other. The Bible's aim, as I read it, is not the freeing of the spirit from the world. It is the handbook of their interaction. It says that they cannot be divided; that their mutuality, their unity, is inescapable; that they are not reconciled in division, but in harmony. What else can be meant by the resurrection of the body? The body should be " filled with light," perfected in understanding. And so everywhere there is the sense of consequence, fear and desire, grief and joy. What is desirable is repeatedly defined in the tensions of the sense of consequence. "
34
" Are you what is called a lucky man? Well, you are sad every day. Each day has its great grief or its little care. Yesterday you were trembling for the health of one who is dear to you, today you fear for your own; tomorrow it will be an anxiety about money, the next day the slanders of a calumniator, the day after the misfortune of a friend; then the weather, then something broken or lost, then a pleasure for which you are reproached by your conscience or your vertebral column; another time, the course of public affairs. Not to mention heartaches. And so on. One cloud is dissipated, another gathers. Hardly one day in a hundred of unbroken joy and sunshine. And you are of that small number who are lucky! As for other men, stagnant night is upon them. "
― Victor Hugo , Les Misérables
40
" Some things cannot be fixed; they can only be carried. Grief like yours, love like yours, can only be carried.
Survival in grief, even eventually building a new life alongside grief, comes with the willingness to bear witness, both to yourself and to the others who find themselves inside this life they didn’t see coming. Together, we create real hope for ourselves,
and for one another. We need each other to survive.
I wish this for you: to find the people you belong with, the ones who will see your pain, companion you, hold you close,
even as the heavy lifting of grief is yours alone. As hard as they may seem to find at times, your community is out there. Look
for them. Collect them. Knit them into a vast flotilla of light that can hold you. "
― Megan Devine , It's OK That You're Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn't Understand