Friends...
I believe that Hope is always possible regardless of the circumstances we are faced with.
Viktor Frankl had it right in his book Man's Search for Meaning...
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
As independent minded and blessed human beings, we have the ability to decide how to react to the things that have occurred in our lives... We can choose a path of defeat or use those things we experience as opportunities... Once we've honored whatever feelings arise we can hope to accept that what is past is past. From there, we can learn from what has happened, and then decide what we will do with what has occurred. After the circumstances of our family tragedy, we chose to embrace life, and live each moment with the hope that each new day allows for new and amazing possibilities.
Remember...on wind and light, all things are possible. Peace and Blessings.
Original Article from 12.2012...
An Open Letter to Grieving Friends. Dedicated to people of Newtown, Upstate New York, and others grieving recent losses.
Dear Friends,
You don’t know me personally, but I wanted to share my experience with you. I do this with the wish that my story may offer a small ray of hope as you go on your grief journey in this New Year. While the pain of your events are fresh, please trust me when I say that the passage of time, an open heart, hard work, and a choice to embrace hope will allow you to survive the tragic events of the last few months. If your family is like mine, joy will eventually come back, and you will find that while much has been lost, grace will return to you. You will never be able to replace your loved ones, but blessings will come to help you continue living with knowledge that the love you hold and the love your departed had for you will never disappear.
It is just after Christmas as I write this. As I look back at the holiday, I am thankful that my family was able to have fun. We visited with relatives and friends, worshipped, ate well (maybe a bit too well), laughed (we experienced many real belly laughs) and generally rejoiced in this 2012 Christmas season. My kids (ages 16, 11, and 8) took events in with a wonder that fit for their respective ages. They saw cousins, played with toys and electronics, texted friends, and as is usually the case, teased each other (in good natured fashion, or so we tell ourselves :) ). My wife enjoyed seeing her family, had a few glasses of wine, joked around, and although she’s always doing something, she sat down long enough to play a board game or two. As always, I read, made jokes, imbibed, helped where I was needed and played with my Facebook account while watching any soccer game that could be found on TV (I am an admitted soccer addict). In a slight twist from recent years, the new fallen snow was a pleasant surprise up here north of Albany - we haven’t had a real good snow in the last few years, and this one added new life to the season... Recently, I read somewhere that it was a gift from our recently departed loved ones – a thought that I wholeheartedly believe. All in all, it was a blessed holiday, and one in which each moment was felt in an honest and open way.
We weren’t always able to feel the joy we felt this year – While Christmas is a time where hearts become a bit softer, eyes a bit wider, and smiles a bit bigger, that joy was interrupted for us 12 years ago when my 15 month old daughter Sarah died in a tragic accidental window fall. She would be turning 14 this May, which is a fact that never really drifts too far from our thoughts. Sarah died when we were residents of Danbury, CT. during a vacation while we were away on the Jersey Shore. If you are anything like we were during that first season after Sarah’s death, the downtime that occurred in the lull period after the holiday was the one where we were hit square in the face with the grief of our loss. Things were at their worst when the funerals concluded, attention lessened, and the many others who were so wonderful during the immediate window after the tragedy began to move on…while we were firmly cemented to the tragedy. We were in shock at first and doing our best to put on a brave face, but the hardest time came when things slowed down and we were left alone to answer the existential question of "now what?" At that moment, the true work of our grief began.
So, this question is what brings me to this letter. Events in the last few months have seen children taken from us in violent acts like the Sandy Hook shooting and the car accident that occurred on the Northway in upstate New York in the last month. My heart aches with the families that have lost. Personally, these events feel particularly close to me, as one occurred in the place I chose to settle to further my own journey of healing through education and a new career plan (NY Capital District/Clifton Park), while the other occurred in the area I lived, loved, started my family, and where my own grief journey began (Western Connecticut/Danbury).
So with all of this, I want to pass on the message that hope exists despite the pain and confusion you may be experiencing now – While I can’t understand exactly what you are experiencing, I strongly empathize with you as you start this journey. Through our shared proximity in CT and New York, and our similar experiences of loss, you all feel like my family. And as family, I feel a need to pass on the following thoughts. I pass these in a pay it forward fashion as they were offered to me by special angels from both of these communities…Know that I love you all...and cant thank you enough for what you gave to me and my family.
May peace, blessings, and hope find you all during this New Year,
Wesley W. Merritt
You don’t know me personally, but I wanted to share my experience with you. I do this with the wish that my story may offer a small ray of hope as you go on your grief journey in this New Year. While the pain of your events are fresh, please trust me when I say that the passage of time, an open heart, hard work, and a choice to embrace hope will allow you to survive the tragic events of the last few months. If your family is like mine, joy will eventually come back, and you will find that while much has been lost, grace will return to you. You will never be able to replace your loved ones, but blessings will come to help you continue living with knowledge that the love you hold and the love your departed had for you will never disappear.
It is just after Christmas as I write this. As I look back at the holiday, I am thankful that my family was able to have fun. We visited with relatives and friends, worshipped, ate well (maybe a bit too well), laughed (we experienced many real belly laughs) and generally rejoiced in this 2012 Christmas season. My kids (ages 16, 11, and 8) took events in with a wonder that fit for their respective ages. They saw cousins, played with toys and electronics, texted friends, and as is usually the case, teased each other (in good natured fashion, or so we tell ourselves :) ). My wife enjoyed seeing her family, had a few glasses of wine, joked around, and although she’s always doing something, she sat down long enough to play a board game or two. As always, I read, made jokes, imbibed, helped where I was needed and played with my Facebook account while watching any soccer game that could be found on TV (I am an admitted soccer addict). In a slight twist from recent years, the new fallen snow was a pleasant surprise up here north of Albany - we haven’t had a real good snow in the last few years, and this one added new life to the season... Recently, I read somewhere that it was a gift from our recently departed loved ones – a thought that I wholeheartedly believe. All in all, it was a blessed holiday, and one in which each moment was felt in an honest and open way.
We weren’t always able to feel the joy we felt this year – While Christmas is a time where hearts become a bit softer, eyes a bit wider, and smiles a bit bigger, that joy was interrupted for us 12 years ago when my 15 month old daughter Sarah died in a tragic accidental window fall. She would be turning 14 this May, which is a fact that never really drifts too far from our thoughts. Sarah died when we were residents of Danbury, CT. during a vacation while we were away on the Jersey Shore. If you are anything like we were during that first season after Sarah’s death, the downtime that occurred in the lull period after the holiday was the one where we were hit square in the face with the grief of our loss. Things were at their worst when the funerals concluded, attention lessened, and the many others who were so wonderful during the immediate window after the tragedy began to move on…while we were firmly cemented to the tragedy. We were in shock at first and doing our best to put on a brave face, but the hardest time came when things slowed down and we were left alone to answer the existential question of "now what?" At that moment, the true work of our grief began.
So, this question is what brings me to this letter. Events in the last few months have seen children taken from us in violent acts like the Sandy Hook shooting and the car accident that occurred on the Northway in upstate New York in the last month. My heart aches with the families that have lost. Personally, these events feel particularly close to me, as one occurred in the place I chose to settle to further my own journey of healing through education and a new career plan (NY Capital District/Clifton Park), while the other occurred in the area I lived, loved, started my family, and where my own grief journey began (Western Connecticut/Danbury).
So with all of this, I want to pass on the message that hope exists despite the pain and confusion you may be experiencing now – While I can’t understand exactly what you are experiencing, I strongly empathize with you as you start this journey. Through our shared proximity in CT and New York, and our similar experiences of loss, you all feel like my family. And as family, I feel a need to pass on the following thoughts. I pass these in a pay it forward fashion as they were offered to me by special angels from both of these communities…Know that I love you all...and cant thank you enough for what you gave to me and my family.
- Try to focus on individual moments. I understand that you feel wounded right now. Survival of the bad moments comes through the understanding that everything changes. While you may hurt now, try to hang on with the understanding that something will come along to buoy you up in the next moment. You may be familiar with the term “one day at a time…” For the grieving, I would shorten that to an hour, a minute, and if need be, seconds. Sometimes we need to know that pain will not last beyond the next nanosecond. In my experience, that thought offers powerful healing potential.
- Do your best to Stay Open: When wounded, it is a natural reaction to close down and hide. Hiding helps us to ignore the pain. At the same time, it’s also natural to judge others that interact with us for not grieving the way we think they should, or when someone that says something to us that appears insensitive. That judgment however, is a temporary way to deflect our own feelings on others. Our hearts close so we do not feel the full range of our emotion. Unfortunately, burial/deflection/denial of feelings creates toxic outcomes. Conversely, openness allows us to accept things as they are, to see with new eyes and allows us to heal. So while you are inside your moments of pain and longing, cry. Let go. Just keep breathing. The moments of quiet will open doors to help you heal. Hug the others that feel awkward. Find support in friends. If needed, enlist a professional. Walk in nature. Write in a journal. Paint something. Draw. Find a way to give to others. Breathe the air. Listen to the wind. Feel the light on your skin. Amazing things happen on the wind and the light – trust me...my hope(my deceased child) lives on in wind and light.
May peace, blessings, and hope find you all during this New Year,
Wesley W. Merritt
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