Grieving and Meditation

Grieving and Meditation

for Becky Lynn Killpack

Dislocated, disoriented. Presence, patience, time, waiting, holding space. Acceptance → holding → releasing. Like riding an elevator. Not knowing. Dizziness, shock. Unable to do anything, unable to express emotion. Allowing. Small talk, everything meaningless in comparison, conversation inane. Frantic, frenzied, panicky. Two dimensional. Echoes, bouncing sounds, tilting visuals. Voices, whispering, somewhere inside. Somewhere.

On the descent days before the forest fire of my mind, when my sister was still alive, I sank down and opened the darkness to inhale my destiny. They were days beyond. In earlier seasons, I wouldn't have broken down in such recompense. A blanket of the bleakest neutral indispensabilities, but beautiful, like fodder for later harvest.

Grieving at Practice Period—is a Zen Buddhist retreat the right place to mourn the loss of a loved one? Sitting still in meditation and fully feeling the pain, the physicality of the trauma of loss coupled with emotions and mental cognitions. Confronting suffering, I yearn for space, for the pressure to release. Sometimes I feel I might suffocate, if not for tears, if not for the cracks to fall apart in. To figure out how to resolve suffering, that is the question, isn't it? To accept impermanence?

Now that I have returned to the Zen Practice Period in Crestone, Colorado, I have no choice but to explore the combination, relationship, or experiential dialectic, if you will, between the grieving process and zazen meditation. As I sit still, a cacophony of pains pulse throughout my body, of various qualities, sometimes unbearable, and yet I still don't move. Each of these pains seems to be connected to feelings and emotions, thoughts, and often tears. Moving like waves, unexpected.

Mixed up with all of this, a depressive episode of bipolar disorder emerges, along with a touch of the flu. Phone consultations with my psychotherapist, yoga on the break, taking, still, my medication, my herbs and supplements, drinking lots of water, breathing, and yes, patience.

This is a dream, an illusion. None of this really happened. No.

This is not okay! This can't be! I will not accept this!

As though a web that was woven throughout by body was ripped free and now I'm bleeding all over.

What could I have done and why didn't I do it? I should have I could have why didn't I go there and.... Spend time with her, more time, why didn't I spend more time with her. More time, I need more time. Please don't be gone.

In the mornings I am dizzy all over again. I feel I might suffocate, might have a panic attack. I need more air. Yet I wheeze through it all, a little tingly, one breath at a time.

Help me turn this around: Thank you for the time we shared together. But I want to go dancing. Thank you for the time we shared together. But I want to tell you this story. Thank you for the time we shared together. But... Thank you for the time....