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by Jayita Bhattacharjee
As we melt down in deep grief, the time comes to bow down in the deepest gratitude. Having a loved one in our lives reveals what love is, and reveals how to make every moment rich in life. The loss of all that feeling, those years spent together, can be too much a struggle to absorb. Sadness is the evidence of love. We love, and from such a stark loss, we begin to suffer in the depths of our beings. Grief is the hefty price-tag that comes with loving someone so intensely that when they leave this earth, a part of you leaves with them.
It’s a feeling that undeniably comes to you and is one that you may have to tackle every day, facing the world and this life with what can feel like a void inside. It’s like living with an emotional disability. It requires a whole new perspective of living and knowledge of how to adjust with this sudden disability. From this perspective rises a gratitude for what we do have in our lives, and to love and honor them while we have them with us. Seeing things this way evokes the sense of humility, and we are transformed through adjusting to this new life, perceived through a new lens. Sadness reduces and gratitude seems to rise. Both have their places in our lives.
The vista changes in another way. Sunlight seems to be outpouring, the blooms seems to be breaking in laughter, the hills seem to be calling us to go and listen to the music of this earth. The moment we take nothing for granted, everything we behold seems to be beautiful. Our gratitude makes us more enlightened in the process. With the rolling on of time sadness sees a descent, and in deep humility we grow prolifically as we expand through our thankfulness. This humility raises us to an awareness beyond words. We bow down in appreciation for what we have while we have it. As sunlight floods our eyes and we get another chance to wake up each new morn, we embrace the dawn knowing how gracefully the night parted to make way for the sun to rise.
How tremendous is the sacrifice on the part of this night and how things end to make room for another beauty to reveal in the life. So, when a loved one leaves our lives, we feel so blessed to have known them, to have held them, that they made their imprints deep inside. Those years spent together teach us something, leave behind a beauty, and we rise from them with a wealth of wisdom. How blessed we are to have known someone so closely, to have loved so intensely, and yet had to say goodbye—the part that almost chokes the throat. That sense of loss evokes an eye-opening wisdom, so we may never take anything for granted any more. For it is only at the heartbreaking moments of life that all that is ephemeral in love dissipates, and what stays is the eternal beauty. And we realize at the last moments, when someone’s last breath is taken, that life’s precious lesson is gratitude. The intensity of that moment should never be underestimated. With our hearts we feel, and when they leave a part of us seems to die. We do not lose them all at once. We lose them piece by piece.
Hitting the rock bottom makes us stare at the sea of truth. Loving so deeply can be painful. And so, the time rolls on as each day goes. Love and loss, grief and gratitude–how they collide. They fight for the sacred spot in the heart. There goes a tug of war between these extreme emotions. As the days turn into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years, we find gratitude more than grief in every step that unfolds our journey. The shock that loss leaves in its wake leaves a space in the heart for humbleness. Something sacred, something beautiful begins to arise as every loss leaves its own beauty behind.
We build a stronger relationship with life, we enter inside its sacred space in the most intimate silences, needing to explore it so very deeply. It becomes a hunger that goes beyond the material needs and invites us with a deeper calling to go inside. From the hunger, we begin the pilgrimage that ultimately gives us the light of salvation. We are transformed through the earth-shaking grief which brought such an upheaval in the process that we found ourselves in, once again on this pathway of life. A deeper bond is developed with us and life, and all that which we absorb builds and transforms us. We become an authentic version of ourselves. The process is messy and raw, but through all that comes the healing that we so need. As we wrestle with this theory of heartbreak, anger and gratitude at the same time, we rise to a heightened awareness. The blessings of time and space through the process of ache give us the wealth of realizations. We are no longer the same. As we lost something, we now see daylight in a different way. Each day brings gratitude in our lives and we bow down to every miracle that lies in every bend of our paths. We know that what comes must go—and if we must love, then let us love knowing that when the time comes, we need to send the gift back to the divine.
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Jayita Bhattacharjee was born in Calcutta, India, later studied Economics at the University of Houston in Economics and had chosen her career as a trustee and teacher. Her Indian residence is in the vicinity of the famous Belurmath. Currently, she is settled in Tampa, Florida. Her books The Ecstatic Dance of Life, Sacred Sanctuary, Light of Consciousness and Dewdrops of Compassion are among several that she has authored. It was a calling of her soul to write with the ink that kept flowing from her heart. This is what gave her the fulfillment and richness in her heart to shed light on what guides a person to respond to the mystical voice hidden inside, and to soar in a boundless expansion with the limitless freedom of spirit.
