I’ve just spent three days with 80 other people, dancing through grief and gratitude.
I signed up for the workshop a few months back because the teacher had studied with someone whose work I deeply respect. I was curious to see what I might find, what I might learn about the places inside me still asking to be met. There are always more.
And as life tends to do before stepping into deep work, last week delivered a few fresh opportunities to process. New fears, heartbreak, and a sudden loss of trust that had blindsided me and left me feeling raw.
It was perfect timing to dance. Movement can hold what words can’t. Sometimes, how do we even find words for our own sorrow and the world’s? When language fails, the body still knows how to speak. It knows how to shake loose and release what’s been hiding in the dark corners.
One of the rituals invited us to write down what we’re grieving and place it on an altar. Standing there, reading the fragments of other people’s pain, I was reminded how vast grief really is - and how often it’s overlooked:
I’m grieving going through life feeling alone.
I’m grieving the affection I never received.
I’m grieving lost capacity and mobility in my body.
I’m grieving all the times I said yes when my truth was no.
I’m grieving my ageing body.
I’m grieving for animals harmed in the name of food.
I’m grieving lost jobs, marriages, friends, homes, and communities.
I’m grieving the destruction of our earth.
I’m grieving the world at war.
And this… and this… and this.
Most people didn’t come to the workshop because they were deep in grief. They came because they love to dance, and were surprised by what surfaced when they began to move with intention. But I wasn’t surprised. Our bodies faithfully keep what we haven’t yet had the space, safety, or support to feel. They store it patiently until we’re ready to return.
And when we do, when we meet our grief with love instead of resistance, something sacred happens. There’s a kind of softening that feels holy. We become more human. We remember our tenderness. Compassion grows. Beauty appears everywhere. Joy and aliveness return.
Grief doesn’t demand much from us. Not really. Only that we meet it, sit with it, and stay with it until it shifts. It’s one of the simplest - and the hardest - things to do.
You don’t need three days of dancing. You don’t need to scream or rage or make it dramatic. You don’t even need to cry. You just need to find a way to be with it.
Here’s a gentle way to begin:
• Light a candle
• Name one thing that has left your life or is changing
• Take a breath. Then whisper: “Thank you for being part of me. I’ll carry you with me always.”
• Then let your body decide what comes next. It might be a sigh, a tear, a tremble, swaying, a moment of stillness. It’s all release. Trust that your body knows what to do
Even a few moments of honest attention is enough. Every time you feel a little more than you did yesterday, you’re doing the sacred work of holy release. To grieve is to love. And to love is to be alive.
Lately I’ve been reminding myself that “Right now, it’s like this.” In five minutes, hours, days, weeks or months, it will be different, as long as I continue to allow it and sit with it. I find those words enormously comforting in times of change. Maybe you’d like to try them too? Right now, it’s like this. Right now, it’s like this.
Keep going. We can do it together. Let’s do the work of being with what is for ourselves, our precious hearts and lives, and for the world. The planet needs us more than ever. We need each other more than ever.
You were never broken,
you were becoming.
I think the sadness comes
when we try to hold on to what’s
meant to pass.
We grip the moment.
The person.
The feeling.
Hoping to freeze it in time,
but everything you’ve ever loved
was borrowed.
And the beauty of it was never
in the holding. It was
in the being.
~ Alan Watts
A quick Held Bali retreat update: There are 2 spaces left.
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With love,
Tricia x
If you’re new here, welcome. This space is where I write about love, loss, beauty and the tender art of being human. It’s where I try to make sense of what it means to live with an open heart in a world that keeps breaking.
I believe our grief deserves reverence - not fixing, not rushing - but honouring. When we tend to it with care, it transforms us. It brings us back to life. It brings us home to who we truly are.
If this speaks to you, I’d love you to stay connected. Subscribe to receive future letters, stories, and invitations to gatherings where we remember how to turn our sorrow into something sacred.
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