Grieving and Detachment

Grief and Detachment

As mentioned in earlier posts becoming detached enhances the pleasure we receive from life, not the other way round. Attachments put our focus, attention and energy on future acquisition and past regrets. Detachment enables us to live in the present.

There are of course periods, events or situations in life which are causes for genuine grief. To become free of attachments does not mean that we feel no sense of loss. The fact that happiness resides within does not mean that situations outside our control cannot cause us genuine pain.

To be detached means that because we have realized that our happiness is an internal reality we experience a grief that is full, healthy and complete and leads to healing. Because the loss is not tied to our ultimate happiness we are able to grieve fully and completely without any preoccupation as to our future happiness. Rather than a grief that is liberating, healthy and deep the person that is not detached, internally secure and have a strong sense of self tends to have dysfunctional grieving patterns and habits. Such persons either grieve too much to the point of hysteria, despondency or depression or they repress their feelings, not grieve in full and cause real long term harm to themselves and their relationships.

Do not repress or suppress feelings of genuine loss. Instead recognize that our happiness is separate from and independent of our grief and we can therefore experience the loss with our entire being and then move on and ultimately pass through the sense of loss.

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