For nearly six months my girlfriend was pushing down the thought that she can’t stand her hubs – especially because he was sick. What kind of woman is contemplating divorce after her husband is diagnosed with a chronic condition. She couldn’t let herself think like that!

Or could she? She decided to experiment. What might it be like to notice the thoughts floating in the river of her mind without condemning herself? Could she simply become aware of them? Could she pay attention to her thoughts and the feelings that accompany them?

Could she notice the urge to eat, drink, or otherwise numb herself while noticing?

The answer is YES!!!!! She did it…

With her permission, here is the story… And the outcome.

Just WOW!

If you listen and find the episode helpful, please like it and share it with your friends. Your voice matters, so I invite you to leave a review.

Thank YOU!

LMZ

Stop. Will you pause for a breath?

When I pause and notice, it reminds me that I am alive and I am being lived. What do you notice?

This week’s Grief Heals episode is an offering, not a lesson. A slow, 25-minute walk with breath, grief, body, voice, and the quiet ways emotions try to set us free.

I don’t know what you’re holding these days. If you’re like me, it's more than you can even see.

So, this is for us because it’s about:

• The link between suppressed emotion and chronic illness
  

• The difference between anger and violence, and why I now believe anger is one of the many voices of love
  

• The ache of emotional poverty and the path to becoming resourced
  

• Why we’ve confused numbness with being nice
  

• The generational cost of withholding truth
  

• What happens when we finally scream aloud, witnessed and unedited
  

• And how love might move through us, as us, if we let it
  

This is for anyone who’s ever felt shame for feeling too much, or for not feeling at all.It’s for those of us who want to do better by our neighbors, but have been taught to ignore our own pain.It’s for those who long to breathe fully and live fully especially when it hurts.

After you listen, I invite you to ask yourself:

What part of me has been waiting to be heard?

Let that question breathe with you awhile because what speaks may surprise you.

P.S. Here are the people and practices referenced: Rachel Sachs and her Mind Your Body work (I’m on Day 137 of journal speak!)Francis Weller’s In the Absence of the OrdinaryGabor Maté’s When the Body Says NoHaka, a powerful reminder that emotion belongs in the body, voice, and community.

Let’s keep learning how to feel all the way through, so that we come home to ourselves and one another.

Release Jan 5, 2026

Subject: Salt, then sour, then sweet… and a sky wide enough for all of it

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/yh2OfgeebmYqBgABc7e27er79a9zPg3yQMXH2XMJc59SnpGjNSUNJPQpHNH4vE0g.n0fvOWXE_jnEz3RF?startTime=1764002383000

Passcode: 91&M!QN5

Before I recorded this, I listened to Salt, then Sour, then Sweet, which plays at the end of Come See Me in the Good Light.

It surprised me when I slid down the wall, feeling the weight of my body too heavy to stand upright. Squatted down, my hand over my heart, I could feel the ache, the beauty, the memory, the love… all of it living in me at once.

Like life, this episode isn’t linear. It weaves and connects through pain, shame, old church doctrines and new kinds of dignity.

I used to despise my weakness, especially the parts of me that didn’t feel smart enough, composed enough, good enough. Becoming a ‘christian’ helped me cover grief with Scripture and performance, to wrap pain in Bible verses and shoulds.

Now, I believe that what love does is notice.

Maybe grief is LOVE, noticing.

Today, I share old stories in new ways – The divorce that felt like failure. My naked body in the mirror, never again to be touched by a lover. Shame when I accidentally posted something too vulnerable and felt stupid and exposed.

How I softened to the despised and rejected in me.

In a world that prizes the hero, the strong, the conqueror, it is so good to feel grief that holds, instead of hides.

Healing is not born on the battlefield, but in the mirror, the backyard, the breath, the body that won’t be ignored anymore.

So, if you feel like you’re too much, or not enough… if you’re tired of trying to outgrow your wounds… if something in you is slowly being smoothed like river stone by years of holding and noticing and being held…

Come listen.

P.S. A few things that held me as I recorded this:

Salt, Then Sour, Then Sweet ~ song.

Come See Me in the Good Light ~ the new doc on Andrea & Megan’s love story.

The Beast in Me on Netflix ~ a living example of that Gospel of Thomas line: “If you do not bring forth what is within you, what is within you will destroy you.”

Before I recorded this, I listened to, Salt, then Sour, then Sweet, which plays at the end of Come See Me in the Good Light.

It surprised me when I slid down the wall, feeling the weight of my body too heavy to stand upright. Squatted down, my hand over my heart, I could feel the ache, the beauty, the memory, the love… all of it living in me at once.

Like life, this episode isn’t linear. It weaves and connects through pain, shame, old church doctrines and new kinds of dignity.

I used to despise my weakness, especially the parts of me that didn’t feel smart enough, composed enough, good enough. Becoming a ‘christian’ helped me cover grief with Scripture and performance, to wrap pain in Bible verses and shoulds.

Now, I believe that what love does is notice.

Maybe grief is LOVE, noticing.

Today, I share old stories in new ways – The divorce that felt like failure. My naked body in the mirror, never again to be touched by a lover. Shame when I accidentally posted something too vulnerable and felt stupid and exposed.

How I softened to the despised and rejected in me.

In a world that prizes the hero, the strong, the conqueror, it is so good to feel grief that holds, instead of hides.

Healing is not born on the battlefield, but in the mirror, the backyard, the breath, the body that won’t be ignored anymore.

So, if you feel like you’re too much, or not enough… if you’re tired of trying to outgrow your wounds… if something in you is slowly being smoothed like river stone by years of holding and noticing and being held…

Come listen.

P.S. A few things that held me as I recorded this:

Salt, Then Sour, Then Sweet ~ song.

Come See Me in the Good Light ~ the new doc on Andrea & Megan’s love story.

The Beast in Me on Netflix ~ a living example of that Gospel of Thomas line: “If you do not bring forth what is within you, what is within you will destroy you.”