Tips and Advice on Mourning

● Zuba mentions many times throughout the book that the death of a loved one will cause
us to question everything that we know (God, existence, death, etc.). This happens
because we have been cracked open completely, and that our world as we know it has
shattered.
● Zuba outlines throughout his book that there is NO time limit on your grief journey, and
that you are not alone on this journey.
● He states that when you lose someone that you love, you have to make the decision to
continue living throughout the rest of your life, and that this is because life still has other
plans for you, but you have to choose to keep living.
● Zuba criticizes the “5 stages of grief” throughout his book, as well as other ways of
mourning and giving that he called the old way to do grief. This criticism is due to the fact
that learning to live with the death of a loved one is not orderly or predictable. Grief is an
internal, automatic response to loss, and it is messy, unpredictable, wild, uncertain,
ever-changing, unsettling, and unnerving.
● He states that grief is something that can express itself in many different ways, and that
it can also show up in physical ways such as pain, insomnia, increased heart rate, etc.
● A quote from this book that I believe is super important to remember is “In order to get
out you must go through. Period. You must give yourself permission to mourn”.
● Zuba includes many different specific things that we can do to heal after losing a loved
one, and some of these things include:
○ Writing in a journal every day about what you are feeling, thinking, doing, hoping
for, fearful of, or dreaming of. Do this everyday for at least a week with no
censoring and you might see that journaling is a concrete way to mourn.
○ Spend about 15-20 minutes a day in silence, just you, and just listen to your
breath, your heart beating, the birds singing, your god, for the voices of your
loved ones you have lost, etc. You could even light a candle, have some tea,
doodle, take a bath, or meditate. You can use this time to just slow down,
reconnect, and spend time with yourself and just listen.
○ Commit to crying. Allow yourself to cry everyday, whenever you feel the urge to.
Remind yourself that when you cry, you are healing. Zuba says that crying is the
body’s way of clearing out the old and making room for the new.
○ Start a gratitude journal. For this, look for things throughout the day to be grateful
for. Try to write down at least 3-5 things every day for a week that you are
thankful for.
○ Rebuild your body. You can do this by walking outside everyday, eating healthy,
drinking 8 glasses of water a day, exercising, practicing yoga, doing Zumba, or
getting a massage.
● Zuba recommends not trying to “go back to the life you had”, or else you will get stuck in
a sort of limbo that some people end up being stuck in forever.
● Zuba highlights that the relationship that you once had it’s the person that has passed is
still there, and it will always continue. You must be the one to allow yourself to realize
this and accept that that person will always be with you. You could see them in the birds,
hear them in a song, or even smell them in the flowers. This book really hammers home
that love is eternal, and in turn, so are we.
● During your healing journey, you may notice that you still are holding some beliefs that
cause you nothing but pain. Part of healing is identifying these beliefs and replacing
them with a new belief that brings you peace instead of pain. An example of these
painful beliefs that we typically continue to hold onto would be “they were taken from us
too soon”. We must realize that it is the language that we use to describe the death of a
loved one that tells the story of whether or not we will heal. In the case of this example,
you could reframe this belief, and choose to accept that all people die on time, and that it
simply was that person’s time to go.
● One thing that is mentioned throughout this book is that you are stronger than you think
you are. You have experienced something that most people don’t experience often, and
you were required to be strong to survive that. Zuba says, “you have already walked
through fire, and you can do it again”.
● Zuba also talks a lot about seeing and believing in signs, symbols, and messages that
represent or are sent by our lost loved ones. He describes a river where on one side
stands the people who have made the conscious decision to look at signs, and view
them as their loved ones still talking to them. On the other side of this river stands the
people who question this, or don’t believe this at all. He says that once you can
consciously make the decision to view these signs as still being connected to your loved
ones, you are able to cross a bridge to go to the other side of the river and continue to
heal.
● Remember, when someone that you love passes away, you will feel two voices within
you. One will be saying things like “Yes! Let’s get back on the horse. We want to live and
feel good again!”, while the other will be saying “No! It’s too scary and we will just get
hurt again!”. You are the one in control of which voice you will follow and listen to. It
begins with simply setting the intention to say yes to life, and picturing yourself getting
back onto that horse. You have to decide this in spite of the fact that someone you love
has just died, and not because of it.