Dying to Grieve
Early on in the COVID-19 pandemic a Harvard Business Review article on grief made its rounds in my social and professional circles. The first thought I had was, "Yes! This is exactly what we are experiencing—grief." We often think of grief as something experienced only after death. This article made clear that there are many forms of grief, and that we can find ourselves in this period of “discomfort” following any form of loss. What made the grief of the pandemic easier to handle, in my opinion, was the fact that there was a collective recognition that we are all in this together. That many of us were feeling this sense of loss for different reasons, all of which were valid. In those initial periods of grief, we found comfort in humor, in stepping up to support our communities, in cheering for first responders and essential workers, in standing on balconies and hollering at the air. What stands out about all these ways of dealing with grief is that, despite practicin...