A Powerful Formula for Leaning Into Loss
Last week, I found out that one of our former managers the Department of Justice died suddenly on Sunday from an accident in his home.
Steve had retired from the Department a few years ago, was enjoying retirement with his family, spending lots of time with his grandkids, and had a lot of life ahead of him.
As an attorney at DOJ in the Environment and Natural Resources Division, he built an impressive career as one of the leading experts in enforcing violations of the federal Clean Water Act (CWA). He was sought-after for panel discussions in the legal community and was vital in helping inform policy around the CWA. And although he was retired, his loss will leave a giant hole in the legal community.
His sudden death also sent shockwaves through my close-knit DOJ family. Within a few minutes, I had multiple texts and emails from my friends and former colleagues, all trying to process what had happened . . . .
all feeling the sadness and grief for his family.
And in those messages, one of my friends said that right before she received the news, she had actually thought about asking me to write about leaning into loss.
So, at her request, let me give this a try . . .
And let me start by saying this: there is no one way to cope with loss.
Loss is a deeply personal experience and journey.
So, I’m not here to “Dear Abby” our way out of loss for each and every person who may be reading this.
All I can do is speak from my own experience and share the one thing that I’ve learned:
The more I resist the loss, the more suffering I experience.
Thus, the invitation I extend is this:
to lean into less resistance of the loss.
“Loss” encompasses a wide range of experiences.
There’s loss of:
Life
A loved one or friend (through death or change in relationship)
An animal family member
A job
A home
Personal items
Identity
Physical and cognitive abilities
Income or financial stability
Perspective or direction
Safety
Power
Freedom
Autonomy
I could go on and on.
The point is that loss is baked into our human experience, whether we like it or not.
Sometimes a loss can be more positive – like the loss of unwanted weight.
Sometimes the loss can be inconsequential – like the loss of a toenail from wearing hiking or running shoes that are too small (raise your hand!).
Sometimes the loss can be heavier – like the ones listed above.
Whether it’s a loss of income or loss of a loved one, the experience of loss is personal and unique to everyone and to every situation.
Some people may feel that the loss of a job is more intense than the loss of a family member.
And some people may feel the loss of their furbaby more intensely than the loss of a job.
As with so many things in life, I believe that we do ourselves and each other a great disservice if we try to compare our losses.
One person may not understand how someone else can be so devastated by the loss of a furbaby.
That first person may have a difficulty finding empathy or compassion for that second person who is feeling that loss very deeply. Consequently, the first person may try to “find the positive” or encourage the person who lost their pet that “it will all get better.”
When we get into the mode of comparing losses and how we think someone else should or shouldn’t experience a particular loss, we denigrate that person’s own experience.
On the flip side, when we think that our own losses aren’t “as bad” as someone else’s loss, we denigrate our own experience of our own loss.
Although that second kind of comparison may help some people feel like it gives them perspective or helps them move through their loss, there can be a risk of denial when we downplay our own losses. It can disconnect us from the experience of our loss, which may be the desired intent. After all, when a loss is so heavy and intense, why would we want to connect with it or the experience of it?
Why wouldn’t we want to "compare it away" . . .
push it away . . .
deny the experience of it . . .
downplay its intensity?
Here’s why: that type of reaction to loss creates more suffering.
Whether we’re comparing away our own loss, questioning how deeply someone else is experiencing loss, or wanting to run away from the experience of the loss altogether, human beings seem to have an innate resistance to loss.
Loss often feels like our “control” has been taken away. Our stability shattered. The rug pulled out from under us.
Naturally, we don’t like that . . . and we will do anything not to feel the pain associated with that loss.
But we can learn to work with that desire to avoid the pain of the loss – for ourselves or for others.
There’s a mind blowing equation that I’ve shared a lot, and it’s worth re-sharing. It was developed by Buddhist Monk, Shinzen Young, and it’s powerfully simple and brilliant:
Suffering = Pain x Resistance
Write that on a piece of paper and tape it above your desk or on your bathroom mirror.
Tattoo it on your forearm.
Whatever you do, install it in your brain like a computer program that runs in the background.
The beauty of this equation is in the recognition that life IS and WILL HAVE pain.
If you’re a living, breathing human, life will find ways to introduce pain. There’s no way around it.
But, how much we suffer in the face of that pain, is up to us.
This may raise the question: “What’s the difference between suffering and pain?”
Pain is the thing that happens to us – whether it’s a physical pain like stubbing your toe in the middle of the nite, or an emotional pain like the death of a loved one. Pain is a signal in the body, notifying us that something needs our attention – like some ice on the stubbed toe or some compassion when a loved one dies. Pain has information for us.
Suffering is the tension we create around that pain. It’s the stories we tell ourselves around that pain, or the meaning we make of the pain. Like berating yourself for how clumsy you are for stubbing your toe, or telling yourself that you don’t know how to live your life without your loved one there anymore.
Tension around pain will tend to arise naturally. We are going to try to resist pain when we feel it. To make it go away, ignore it, or – as so many Baby Boomers and Gen X’ers were raised to do – “push on through it.”
But all of that – even pushing through the pain – can be a form of resistance. Yes, even when you try to push through pain with all the intensity of a bulldozer going through a wall, there’s still resistance. Instead of allowing that pain, i.e., the wall, to just be there, you’re trying to get rid of it by knocking it down.
(Side note: I’m not talking here about physical pain in athletic competitions. So, let’s save the comments about pushing through pain on the race course for another day).
It’s understandable that we resist pain. Our beautiful human brains like to make us believe that we can control everything.
So, when something painful happens, often our first instinct is to “fix it.” “Figure it out.” “Make it go away.”
Therein lies the resistance.
Freezing or shutting down in the face of pain also is resistance. Completely checking out, disconnecting, ignoring the pain – those are all forms of denial. And denial – you guessed it – is resistance.
So, let’s bring this back to loss.
Most loss is a form of pain. (I say “most” because the loss of 10 pounds for someone can be a joyous event).
Like pain, loss in life is inevitable.
And when we lose someone or something in our lives, often our first natural reaction is denial or disbelief (hello, resistance). We may then move into a host of other forms of resistance – like shutting down, checking out, distracting ourselves, trying to make things better, pushing through the pain, controlling the circumstances, bartering for a different result.
I know all of those forms of resistance well.
Ten and a half years ago when I was standing on the corner of 6th and D Streets in Washington, D.C. talking to a friend, I got a panicked call from my brother saying that our mom had died.
I vividly remember my initial reaction was “No, this can’t be happening” – a completely normal and natural form of resistance that is bound to arise in the face of any painful event.
And then the spiral of resistance continued. At one point in those next couple of hours, I distinctly remember saying to someone, “I can’t do my life without my mom.”
In the weeks . . . months . . . and years that followed, I often sought (and still occasionally do seek) shelter and control in various types of resistance, including wishing – with every cell in my body – that I could just have one more moment with her.
Had I known back then and throughout the years what I’ve learned the last couple of years, I could have shepherded myself through my grieving process more skillfully (which is still ongoing) by leaning into less resistance.
Leaning into allowing the experience of the loss of my mom to just be what it is.
Let me pause here and be crystal clear on what leaning into less resistance and into more allowing is not.
Less resistance/more allowing is not:
Looking for the silver lining
Rolling over
Inaction
Agreeing with or condoning the situation
Denying the impact or gravity of the situation
Flippantly saying “everything happens for a reason”
Less resistance and more allowing is an opening . . .
creating space for what has already happened and what we cannot control to be there.
It’s catching yourself in that moment of “no, this can’t be happening” and, instead, inviting yourself into “this has happened. Now what can I do?”
And maybe what you do is cry for several hours . . .
rage and vent about your anger . . .
show compassion to yourself or others . . .
discern what actions can be taken to tend to the pain and ease further suffering.
We invite ourselves to lean into less resistance and more allowing because we can’t change the painful thing that happened . . .
because we can influence how we respond to what happened and how much we suffer in the face of it.
We can learn to ease our own suffering and the suffering of others, not by trying to push away or push through the pain, but by resisting it less and allowing the existence of that pain to be there.
In the face of loss, we can lean into an awareness that this loss – this pain - in this moment, is here, and we can’t make it go away.
And see if that eases or loosens or lightens the suffering – the tension - around that loss.
It doesn’t mean the suffering itself will go away completely. Maybe it will . . . in time and with a practice of easing the resistance.
But if leaning into easing the resistance to loss means that you can experience even one degree less of suffering, what could that mean for you?
If you have a painful event that is a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10 in terms of intensity, and you resist that event at a degree of 8, then your suffering is 80.
What if you could ease that resistance to a level of 7? Your suffering would be one degree less.
How would that feel?
What kind of space and energy would that free up in you to move though the experience of your loss?
How would you be able to make decisions about what you want to do in the face of that loss?
And what kind of agency and power could you feel if you knew that you could ease your own suffering around the pain of the loss?
Lastly, this is not an invitation to throw up your hands and say “c’est la vie!” or “embrace the suck.”
That, my dear, could be another form of resistance (through denial or avoidance) (unless you’re a total Jedi mind warrior who’s done a lot of work with resistance).
Rather, the invitation here is to lean in.
Lean into a little less resistance of whatever pain you’re experiencing in your life.
The loss of Steve and the pain surrounding his death leaves a gaping hole in the hearts of our DOJ Section, in the environmental law world, in his community, and – most palpably – in his family.
My hope for all of us fortunate enough to have experienced the beautiful human that Steve was, is that we can soften around the pain of that loss . . .
to lean into a little less resistance . . .
and allow that gaping hole of his loss to connect us all in the shared joy of what it meant to know him.