"Who Dies?"

This is an excerpt from a book by the same name -- "Who Dies?", by Stephen Levine. It's a rather old "classic", published in 1982, but I just came accross it in the course of other things I was reading recently, and was reminded how great a teacher, counselor, writer and human being Steven Levine is. He and his wife, Ondrea, have been seminal figures in working with loss, particularly death and grief, and have been a big influence on me. And this is one of the finest pieces I have read in ages.

I find it deeply comforting and real -- real in a kind of radical way, it's a different way of seeing things altogether -- but that it mirrors how I've been feeling within myself more and more as time goes on. It's validating and reassuring to know my thoughts around this have not been morbid so much as turning toward something freeing.

Lately, I have felt that things in me have died, things I desperately have wanted, that I know will never be reconstructed, things that are too late, things I can never have back, which has reached terrifying peaks; but there is an alternative to such fear. Rather than seeing myself as a piece of something left over with something irretrievably missing, leaving me a partial, amputated human being, this other way of seeing helps me feel that there is wholeness even in the state of loss because they exist at the very same time. Losing what has been cherished does not have to leave me "incomplete"...part alive, part dead. But it takes a shift in thinking.

I hope sharing this here will be of value to others, whether you're dealing with the painful experience of a loved one's death (which is going to happen to all of us before our own death), or just trying to live within your own mortality better. It could just as easily be in the "Relationships" forum as "Grief", even though it is a way of dealing with the pain of death.

*****

Who Dies?

by Stephen and Ondrea Levine

Once someone asked a well-known Thai meditation master, "In this world where everything changes, where nothing remains the same, where loss and grief are inherent in our very coming into existence, how can there be any happiness? How can we find security when we see that we can't count on anything being the way we want it to be?" The teacher, looking compassionately at this fellow, held up a a drinking glass that had been given to him earlier in the morning and said, "You see this goblet? For me, this glass is already broken. I enjoy it. I drink out of it. It holds my water admirably, sometimes even reflecting the sun in beautiful patterns. If I should tap it, it has a lovely ring to it. But when I put this glass on a shelf and the wind knocks it over, or my elbow brushes it off the table and it falls to the ground and shatters, I say, 'Of course.' When I understand that this glass is already broken, every moment with it is precious. Every moment is just as it is, and nothing need be otherwise."

When we recognize that, just like that glass, our body is already broken, that indeed we are already dead, then life becomes precious, and we open to it just as it is, in the moment it is occurring. When we understand that all our loved ones are already dead -- our children, our mates [love partners], our friends -- how precious they become. How little fear can interpose; how little doubt can estrange us. When you live your life as though you're already dead, life takes on new meaning. Each moment becomes a whole lifetime, a universe unto itself.

When we realize we are already dead, our priorities change, our heart opens, and our mind begins to clear of the fog of old holdings and pretendings. We watch all life in transit, and what matters becomes instantly apparent: the transmission of love; the letting go of obstacles to understanding; the relinquishment of our grasping, of our hiding from ourselves. Seeing the mercilessness of our self-strangulation, we begin to come gently into the light we share with all beings. If we take each teaching, each loss, each gain, each fear, each joy as it arises and experience it fully, life becomes workable. We are no longer a "victim of life." And then every experience, even the loss of our dearest one, becomes another opportunity for awakening.

If our ony spiritual practice were to live as though we were already dead, relating to all we meet, to all we do, as though it were our final moments in the world, what time would there be for old games or falsehoods or posturing? If we lived our life as though we were already dead, as though our children were already dead, how much time would there be for self-protection and the re-creation of ancient mirages? Only love would be appropriate, only the truth.

Thanks, TOV. That helps.

Thanks for sharing that. I am not so sure I agree with the premise of assuming we are already dead. I prefer the notion that we are alive and well but anything can happen to change that so we have to "stop and smell the roses" while we can and not take life for granted.

Cab, I guess I can relate to that more because I've been particularly down about life lately...having sentiments about not wanting to continue to live because I don't see any point in the whole endeavour when even the pleasantries of life bring me little...well, pleasure. When I think that I'll be dying anyways in however many years, it sort of takes away the point of ending one's life. It makes me think of my life as more of a tool for helping others. I'm not using it...I might as well employ it in the service of the world.

I think the state of mind is not that we are dead in a literal sense, but that we can hold a sense of our and everyone's built-in "breakability" at the very same time, so that when it does happen, it feels like a part of the nature of being that was there all along.

Though I do believe in living fully and smelling the roses, too.

It's just a different way of seeing things, and one that is resonant for me right now because I'm trying to reconcile the "dead" pieces with the ones that are alive. It makes much more sense to me that ALL of me is dead in the sense of the inevitable being built in, and at the same time ALL of me is still alive. That there aren't pieces that are gone and the rest is trying to survive. It's all gone and it's all here, at the same moment.

Like I said, it's a bit different...

Cab, I guess I can relate to that more because I've been particularly down about life lately...having sentiments about not wanting to continue to live because I don't see any point in the whole endeavour when even the pleasantries of life bring me little...well, pleasure. When I think that I'll be dying anyways in however many years, it sort of takes away the point of ending one's life. It makes me think of my life as more of a tool for helping others. I'm not using it...I might as well employ it in the service of the world.

Exactly. I'm feeling a lot of the same way. And it's very depressing to think, "I just have to somehow survive to the finish line with all that's missing"...but it's NOT depressing for me to think, "I am ultimately finished anyway, so everything else is a bonus that I can make some great use of, and actually take joy from," without that being some goal I'm gripping painfully at and there being some hole to fill. More just living, less fearing what isn't there or can't be or is gone.

Those who concentrate on death, fail to really live. Life is for living, nothing else. It is how we spend our time on earth that counts, not when it ends. If someone we love dies, and I have gone through this quite a few times, that does not give us the right to stop living. We are given life to live, and are expected to do exactly that. Give to others, try to make a difference, and make those who have gone on before us proud. That is living.

that does not give us the right to stop living.

I don't think it's a question of a "right" to stop living. You have a "right" to feel whatever you feel, and sometimes that's paralysis. You have a right to feel that way if that's part of your grief.

Some people who are grieving (myself included) feel that their life, or part of it, has ceased.

This paradigm allows for death and life to coexist, to hold them in awareness at the same time and not feel destroyed by the death element.

I think about death a lot, but I would certainly not say that I'm not "truly living."

You have a lot of judgments, jigsup, in your words. "Fail to", "expected to", "no right to", about human feelings. Lots of "shoulds" there. Good if that works for you. It doesn't work for everyone to feel by rule books.

I should add, this piece is not well grasped in meaning without the opening parable.

You have a lot of judgments, jigsup, in your words. "Fail to", "expected to", "no right to", about human feelings. Lots of "shoulds" there. Good if that works for you. It doesn't work for everyone to feel by rule books.

I think that that is the reason why some people kill themselves...they feel like they CAN'T continue feeling or coping in the way that society believes that they "should". And when they express how they feel differently, people can't understand. "why do you feel depressed? How can you not know why you're depressed? Why can't you just continue? Other people have it worse." these are the questions and statements I got from my mother when I told her I was depressed and had thought about ending my life. She's a wise woman, though, and I can't fault her for saying those things. But the fact of the matter is, "Life goes on" isn't a salve for everyone, even "rational" people with goals and a good future.

I'm an athiest. I don't believe in the afterlife. I don't believe in the hand of judgement, so I don't believe that anything is waiting for me. I plan on living until my body, my ability to do and act in this world, and my sense of purpose is exhausted, and no longer.

I'm so glad you said that. I totally agree.

I myself have been (and even recently) so low, that I have had to search for alternatives to ending my life in my thinking process. And I would not say it's because I don't love or live life (or at least FEEL life) fully that I have felt "dead" at times, but because the pain of losing so many dreams and hopes and aspects of myself can be too much at times, or so it seems. You can love life and all the possibilities it holds and still want to end it because the nature of losing things that you cling to is so immense, and the not knowing who or how to be without them. I think you can't understand that kind of despair unless you've actually felt that way yourself.

"Life goes on" can ring really hollow sometimes. It can be so coldly impersonal. And one must find a personal affinity with life's qualities other than that it just "goes on", to feel a belonging in life, to want to stay.

I kind of envy people who are religious because they believe in mandates that are already set in place. When you don't have that, you have to swim in the dark, looking for your own liferaft. You have to reconcile why on earth you'd stick around here when for every gain, there is loss, sometimes such heavy loss that it rips out your raison d'etre.

I think it's even more disconcerting when something that you believed you could live without gets torn away...and you realize that it meant more to you than you ever believed that it even could. I think it tests you in ways that expected losses can't. For me, it rendered even the beautiful things in life, things I had regained and loved, like poetry, music, painting...dead and cold to me. Instead of being an outlet to reconnecting with life, they are all merely reminders of what I lost...

I try so hard to cling to the things that I have in life, the love that others have for me...but love is not enough. We don't stay alive for other people, do we? We all try to re-focus and believe that we ARE good enough, that good times will come again, that we can, once again, be happy. A loss isn't a loss in a cosmic sense; it's a piece of YOUR life slipping away. A person was not as much an entity in and of itself as it is a reflexive part of your universe. And your grief is selfish in that you are mourning a part of YOUR life that is gone...because, for the person that is passed, there is nothing more, nothing to be sad for, nothing to regret, only room enough to be happy that they lived at all.

But that's never how we feel, is it?

PS: I envy the religious as well. I wish I could pray and actually believe that it might, somehow, make a difference.

"In the Kamigata area, they have a sort of tiered lunchbox they use for a single day when flower viewing. Upon returning, they throw them away, trampling them underfoot. The end is important in all things."

I think it's even more disconcerting when something that you believed you could live without gets torn away...and you realize that it meant more to you than you ever believed that it even could. I think it tests you in ways that expected losses can't. For me, it rendered even the beautiful things in life, things I had regained and loved, like poetry, music, painting...dead and cold to me. Instead of being an outlet to reconnecting with life, they are all merely reminders of what I lost...

I really feel for that, yes...I have felt the same. I am going through a phase right now where a lot of my creativity feels blocked because the experiences are almost too painful to try to make words of pictures out of. I wish I were one of those artists who, the madder they got, the sadder they felt, the more furious and brilliant their works. I'm not like this, unfortunately. When my lifeforce has sustained such great blows, the lights within flicker on and off, with a pale glow. But at some point, usually there is a strength that re-emerges with a freshness, to tell the story...it's just not something you can try to pull up and force when in the depths of grieving.

We really often don't know how much we depend on something until it's gone, and if we do, then we are often living a life of fear, anticipatory fear; whether or not life feels dangerously precarious, at some point we are faced with the same inevitable question, how to derive a sense of wholeness without the need for any particular set of conditions falling into place, let alone the conditions of someone else's path as we walk along our path.

I try so hard to cling to the things that I have in life, the love that others have for me...but love is not enough. We don't stay alive for other people, do we?

This is about the saddest question there is, I think. The one that can feel most desolate or stark. It runs to the core of asking what we're here for, especially when love is the ultimate reason (I still believe that.) But no, we cannot stay alive for someone else. No matter how we love, or know we are loved, there has to be some even greater commitment to ONESELF. If we lose that commitment to oneself, it becomes a very short-lived, flimsy proposition to cling to the idea that someone else is our reason to be here. We can't live as though it were a sacrifice; we must live for the gift it is to embrace the life we have. Even if that involves painful evolution and the shattering of dreams.

A loss isn't a loss in a cosmic sense; it's a piece of YOUR life slipping away. A person was not as much an entity in and of itself as it is a reflexive part of your universe. And your grief is selfish in that you are mourning a part of YOUR life that is gone...because, for the person that is passed, there is nothing more, nothing to be sad for, nothing to regret, only room enough to be happy that they lived at all.

I agree with a lot of this...that grief is for the living. Grief is the sorrow of what you no longer have, the life that has changed irrevocably. I am unable to state with surety what those who are passed feel or don't, but what my belief is, is that they WERE an entity in and of themselves, as all who come into existence are. They are both reflexive of our universe, as well as an integral part of the universe that was created, which has nothing to do with us (as their loved one.) In other words, they have their own score to "settle" with creation. They come here as we do, and we share the universe and the unique bond that is love; but they have their "business" and we have ours. Their life is theirs to live, to determine, to work through, to handle, to not handle, to simply be here for. And when the time comes that they leave, however they leave, that makes their life complete then. Everyone lives a complete life in and of itself, whether it's one breath out of the birth canal, or whether it's 90 years. Some people live more in only 7 years of life than some live in 70. When each end comes though, that life has been full in the way only IT could be full. Yes, you're right -- that if anyone has had a chance to love and be loved, that can be enough. That they go on being loved (and generating love) after they leave is proof that they are not "dead", their body is just gone.

Feeling "full" though, and at peace like this when our thoughts are filled not with large cosmic motions but our bodily and emotional desires here on earth, which are totally natural, sometimes all of this falls to the ground and there are only tears.

Even overarching wisdom can't eradicate the needs of the human psyche. No spiritual understanding can deny the heart its nature. It's so very hard...sometimes knowing something and feeling something takes a long, long time to align. Maybe by many new opportunities to learn it. Maybe over a lifetime.

Thank you, Dags, for the quote. It's so fitting.

For all the things that are lost we must grieve for them. Not to grieve is to show that we do not love or feel. Not to have this aspect of humanity would reduce us to nothing more than biological computers that deal with everything logically and would take loss as nothing more that a fact that would need to processed and logged. Grief is not selfish, grief is proof that we love, that we desire, that we are human.

In grief the pure emotions can be so tangled, so conflicting that the mind can't pick it apart, can't make sense out of them. They just need to be left to flow because they are doing what they need to and as your feelings are part of you I guess that means that you are doing what you need to even if makes no sense. You just have to trust that part of you that it is doing what needs to be done.

Thoughts and feelings shouldn't be regarded as two separate things, just as the physical and spiritual shouldn't be, as they are all aspects to the whole the person that you are and you can only be who you are.

For all the things that are lost we must grieve for them. Not to grieve is to show that we do not love or feel. Not to have this aspect of humanity would reduce us to nothing more than biological computers that deal with everything logically and would take loss as nothing more that a fact that would need to processed and logged. Grief is not selfish, grief is proof that we love, that we desire, that we are human.

I completely agree with this (as well as everything else you said). I'm not sure if I've said something that would seem to contradict this, but just for clarity, I don't think grief is anything but normal, natural, appropriate and as you say, an expression of love, desire and humanity. A life without grief would be cold, hollow and meaningless. It's a necessity.

I don't think it's selfish either, in the way the word selfish is normally understood (that is, ungenerous or unconcerned about others or self-absorbed.) I don't know that RT meant it that way....but I think there's an element of truth in that grief for someone who has died is more about self -- oneself -- than about anyone else. It is the one who has to feel the loss over whom we cry the most. It is the life that has been broken and that still lives to feel the aftermath that causes us pain, and that is OUR life. Of course, we are also grieving for the person who didn't have a chance at a longer life, a life that could continue (with our without us), and that must be grieved, too! Knowing that the world goes on without this person now is just about the saddest thought I can imagine, and how it relates to us is part of that, but part of it is also that the world is missing this person.

There is a saying in the tradition of my birth that says, "When one person dies, the whole world dies." I've mentioned that in this forum before...and I feel that to be so true. Nothing is the same when you take one piece of the puzzle out. And no one belongs to another person, each person belongs to the world. So the whole world weeps, too, for it's loss. I believe every person is precious and when they are no longer here, in a sense, the distant suns know it and cry.

But there are many realities that can go on at the same time. That's the bugger, when there are ambiguities...

So I think there are feelings and thoughts (which generate eachother)...and all of them are valid. I would take nothing away from my experiences of grief....except that sometimes I fight with what acceptance might mean, because the nature of my suffering is so immense, I can't see a way to it. I have not lost a beloved (though I've lost a close relative who was the most important influence in my life) or a child...but I've lost some things that are as painful, just in a different way. I deal with grief that feels so inescapable sometimes and self-perpetuating, I have to take a different kind of view sometimes of reality...if for no other reason than momentary sanity.

One of those views is that loss is inherent to living, and even if we feel griefstricken over something that has happened, and heartsick, it doesn't mean that it was a "mistake" of the universe. Who am I to tell the universe that this shouldn't have happened? Who am I to tell the universe that my life or the life of someone else should have been anything other than what it was, or is?

So from the point of view of "how things are" in life, the parable of the glass shattering makes sense to me, as it does to view myself and others as inherently perishable. Somehow, this makes me rail at the heavens a bit less. "Of course", said the monk. That is how things are. And when I allow myself this mindset....I feel something a little closer to acceptance and peace. I do want to feel every bit of my emotions....but suffering for long, long periods of time and over time is also something that can hinder life as it is still here for us to be had. So I have an interest in dealing with suffering somehow because it takes away more of my life than the loss did, it compounds it all.

I try to cope by looking through an alternate lens....and if it even makes sense on some level, I try to incorporate it in some manner....

Of course, this can't eradicate grief and all the emotions, and I would never think that anyone should strive for that. We couldn't even if we tried. It's just a bit of a relief to see suffering by getting outside our internal experience sometimes, at least for me.

Way too deep a conversation for me at 11:15 at night! But let me try to put my two cents in.

TOV mentioned, "Who am I to ask the universe why?" For the religious, "Who am I to ask God why?" If you believe in the afterlife, then grief is a very selfish emotion. "Why did you take my loved one to live in eternity in God's kingdom?" In this sense, should we not celebrate one's passing from this life to the next? How can we be so selfish to question why our loved one was taken from us to spend eternity with God? Should we not be happy for our loved one? In that regard, Death should be celebrated, not grieved.

With every loss, we need to focus on the time we had, not the time we no longer have. This applies to the broken glass, the loved one, or anything else we have attachment to.

To have this view does not mean that I am not living life to its fullest, but just the opposite. I am living life to it maximum because I can appreciate THE FACT that it will not last forever. I love my wife and children more than anything, more than myself. I accept that I will not be with them forever - that there will be a time in the whole scheme of things that one of us will move on and the other will be without. For some amount of time, we will be apart. We will eventually be reunited. It is the same feeling I have when I am out of town. I miss them terribly, but I know that I will eventually get home and I will appreciate them that much more.

Thank you for weighing in here, Erik, late though the hour was for you! Feel free to continue pondering the thread when you are bright-eyed-and-bushy-tailed and have eons to spare for contemplative issues such as this. I appreciate your input, you're a very thoughtful poster.

I hadn't really seen it as you've laid out here, as graphically as you have, since I am not of a religious bent. And, without turning it into a theological discussion, as I mentioned in another post here, I rather envy the religious, because there is a sense of certainty in belief that much more rapidly brings acceptance. Faith is a very strong process in this life, and I'm learning that more and more and more.

Not being religious though, still forces faith. And for me, in the trials I have weathered and currently am weathering in coping with loss, some sort of parallel has to be found, to find a reason to go on and continue to embrace life anyway, even when one does not know about (or believe in) an afterlife. I am of the "I don't know, I only have some personal hunches" school and my faith then has to grow in how I view life, itself. I don't have to have faith in an afterlife to know that life here, now, is predictably transitory, and so this means that whenever that glass shatters, however it comes to shatter, that was written into the very nature of the living. And that thereforee, my focus should be on how beautiful things are when I've got them.

But thank you for sharing that analogy of being away on a business trip and returning home. That's a very sweet and consoling way to see it, and what a great attitude you have.

I was never religious until one day, I just stopped and listened. I didn't have any "spiritual revelation" or anything like that. I just finally stopped and listened to what God and the universe were trying to tell me. I'm not a religious fanatic, but I am very spiritual and I talk to God every day. I do not go to church, that is run by men and not God. I just like having a Powerful Life Force who loves me and lets me run on and on and doesn't ask me to stop talking. God is good like that. He takes from us by death, that is true. But he gives so much, also. I never drive to work and fail to notice the beautiful mountains so close I can almost touch them. I see the ocean and all it's mystery. The gorgeous sunsets we have here, the warm sun on my face are all gifts from God. So many things! They give me great joy and peace.

I think it's truly wonderful that people believe, as I do, that life should be treasured while we have it and that life should be celebrated.

But I'd just like to add this, in response to Erik:

How can we be so selfish to question why our loved one was taken from us to spend eternity with God? Should we not be happy for our loved one? In that regard, Death should be celebrated, not grieved.

I don't think grieving is selfish. Not at all. As I said earlier in the thread, but want to strongly reiterate. And that certainly wasn't the point of my thread...I don't want to be misinterpreted...a couple of people have mentioned the word "selfish" in relation to grieving, and I just wanted to make it known that I in no way believe grieving is selfish -- it's natural, human and vital that we experience it in the face of loss. I don't think that when someone is ripped away from us, we can or should ask people to celebrate, especially if it was in a tragic way or one filled with a great deal of suffering and pain.

If you could celebrate if one of your children passed away or your wife, Erik, I say you're pretty superhuman. I certainly hope that you wouldn't hold yourself to that, if, heaven forbid, the worst ever happened.

Whether you believe in an afterlife or not, a heaven or not....God or not....we, here on earth must feel all that we must feel, and let our hearts miss, and be broken, too, when that glass breaks. Because we have become one with it in so many ways, there is no going back, to the way it was when it was intact. We are left to pick up the pieces, and that is painful no matter how you look at it.

We must be sensitive to the heartsickness of those who have lost. The people in this forum are in vast amounts of totally human and appropriate anguish.

Grief is to be honored.

Even if life is to be lived.

I agree 100% that grief in necessary in life. As humans, we need to release the emotions we experience when something happens and grief is our minds way of dealing with the process and, ultimately, acceptance. When I say that grief is selfish, I guess a better word would be self-serving.

When we lose someone, there is the process we go through that many of us have read through. Of course there are different steps, but the most common are Denial, Anger, Depression, Acceptance. It is during all of these steps that our faith will help us through. I am not necessarily referring to religious-based faith as faith can come in many forms...

And some clarity on my other statement: Should something happen to a member of my family, I will not celebrate on that day. Again, grief is part of the process. But to get through that process, eventually I will have to celebrate their life. (Trying to keep it non religious) If something were to happen, eventually, I would accept and cherish the time I had with them. I might have regrets, but I will not live in a state of grief and unhappiness forever.

For example, when my father day 13 or so years ago, I remember getting the call from my brother at 3:30 in the morning. (He had been sick and comatose for some time after suffering a stroke, so I knew it was going to happen) After taking the call from my brother, I remember throwing the phone full force against the wall and it shattering. Over the course of months (years?) I went through the grieving process and now I am "happy" about his death in that I know he is causing a bunch of hell in a better place. Occasionally, I have regrets that I didn't listen to his stories and learn more about his experiences. I miss him and feel bad that he never got to meet his grandchildren and that his grandchildren never got to meet (and experience him!) But I am not sad that he died.

Enjoy and cherish what you have, don't dwell over what you have lost.

Grieving is in no way selfish, it means we have a heart, God's greatest creation. Hearts make us caring and unselfish. Hearts give us hope when nothing else does. Hearts keep us going when we would love to give up. Grieving is not selfish, but holding on to your grief is. Let time heal you. And for those who are so overwhelmed they are thinking of ending their lives, Never, Ever, give up....ever.

I'm sorry to hear you've been feeling so low TOV.

I agree with CAD that a good way to look at things is to recognize that you are alive and that even in that aliveness things can change, so it's important never to take anything for granted. Whenever I'm faced with the pain of loss, I try to focus on gratitude. I ask myself, what in my life am I grateful for today? I know you focus on gratitude too, but sometimes it's easy to forget that what we have is more important than what we've lost. It's not that what we've lost doesn't have meaning or that we can't have fond memories. It's just that holding on to things or people we've lost prevents us from truly appreciating what we have in this present moment.

Thank you for your clarifications on your meaning and terminology, Erik. I do think that "self-serving" is a more apt term...those departed actually have business elsewhere, I tend to believe, and no longer have the attachments we do here in this world.

Thanks for that story about your father -- I am still coming to grips with the death of my father. (Though I think it's harder to reconcile oneself to a death of a child or partner than a parent, simply because our parents dying before us seems more "natural" as the seasons of life go.) It's really good that you have such a sturdy foundation of faith in your life, and this made me smile:

I am "happy" about his death in that I know he is causing a bunch of hell in a better place.

I had to smirk, too, thinking of someone causing hell in heaven.

I'm sorry to hear you've been feeling so low TOV.

 

I agree with CAD that a good way to look at things is to recognize that you are alive and that even in that aliveness things can change, so it's important never to take anything for granted. Whenever I'm faced with the pain of loss, I try to focus on gratitude. I ask myself, what in my life am I grateful for today? I know you focus on gratitude too, but sometimes it's easy to forget that what we have is more important than what we've lost. It's not that what we've lost doesn't have meaning or that we can't have fond memories. It's just that holding on to things or people we've lost prevents us from truly appreciating what we have in this present moment.

Thank you so much for your kind and caring remarks, stella, and weighing in on my thread...

How true and wise, what you say...but sometimes as you say, hard to hold to. Yes, I am grateful daily, but sometimes the accumulated losses feel so weighty, I feel a bit frightened about what is left.

Sometimes I feel so whittled down, it's hard to not feel toppled by my losses.

But you are very right, and I think CAD's point is well-taken. I think the key for me is thinking that even if I've been whittled down to the raw materials, as long as I have those, there is always something to be made.