Sometimes, there really are no words to describe the grief people may suffer due to the loss of loved ones and friends, especially when the death is sudden and unexpected. Even after a long-term illness, death, when it happens, can be an enormous shock to those left behind.
In our family alone, we've lost two loved ones in the last 2 1/2 months--a much loved 95+ year old grandfather who was alert and basically healthy up to his last week of life and who tried to not be annoyed with God and the universe that it was "taking so long" for him to move on, get to heaven and see his beloved wife again; and a much loved son, brother, grandson, nephew and cousin, who died unexpectedly 4 days before his 42nd birthday, from a health condition he kept mainly to himself. They are both in a better place, and we are all here with the empty places and spaces in our hearts and homes, seeing them "everywhere" we go. It is, as all who have lost loved ones and friends know, very surreal, for a very long time.
(If you or anyone you know are in need of resources for grief, please check out the post Words for the Elderly, the Sick and the Dying--Practical Resources.)
For anyone who believes in an afterlife, I would like to share some advice I once received from a very wise and experienced psychologist, Dr. Marilyn C. Barrick, with whom I spoke in the early years after my husband died at the age of 36, leaving me with two children under the age of five.
During one counseling session, Dr. Barrick told me two things that made a huge difference in my life and in my grief process. First, she said that if I had any "unfinished business" with my late husband, I could say a prayer to Archangel Michael to take me to the retreats in heaven to meet him there and wrap things up, for as long as it took. There was no limit to the number of times I could make such a request. So, I did. And, after about a year, things shifted, and I rarely had the need for such a prayer, but have, over the last 34 years, occasionally put it to good use. The prayer was something like this, and can be said for anyone who has passed with whom you may need resolution. You can say, "Holy Christ Self," or "Higher Self," or "Higher Power," or whatever works with your beliefs:
"In the name of my Holy Christ Self, I ask Archangel Michael to take me in my soul and soul consciousness to the retreats in heaven to meet with __________. I ask Archangel Michael to guard and protect me and my soul to and from the retreats."
The second thing she told me was, I believe, the most helpful practical spiritual tool I've heard of so far in my life: She told me that I could, at any time, write the Higher Self of my husband and pour out my heart and tell him anything I wanted or needed to; ask Archangel Michael to take the letter to my husband's Higher Self, and that the angels and his Higher Self would make sure he got it (at a soul level). This was the formula she shared with me, and I have used it many, many times over the last 3 decades, not just with my late husband, but with family members and friends who have also passed on:
Sit comfortably at a desk or table and, on a clean sheet of white paper, begin your letter to your loved one by writing almost as you would any other letter:
"Dear Higher Self of ______________, according to God's Will: (Then pour your heart out)
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________.
Love,
___________________"
Then, you fold the letter up, ask Jesus, God, the angels, to fill up the void left in you (after you've poured your feelings into the physical letter) with his Light, with the Light of God, so that no more darkness or suffering enters you.
Next, you say a short prayer to the angels asking them to take the letter to your loved one:
"In the name of my own Holy Christ Self, I ask the Angels to take this letter from my heart to the heart of the Holy Christ Self of ___________."
Then, you safely burn the letter in a pan, fireplace or on a sheet of aluminum foil--wherever you can safely consign the letter to the physical flame, so that it is burned and the angels carry it to the higher realms, the etheric/fire realm, where the Higher Self of your loved one is.
~*~
That's it. I cannot describe how healing and liberating this ritual was and is for me and for others who are aware of this most practical spiritual tool.
Come to the mercy-seat, fervently kneel;
Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish,
Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal.
Hope of the penitent, fadeless and pure;
Here speaks the Comforter, tenderly saying—
Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot cure.
Forth from the throne of God, pure from above;
Come to the feast of love; come, ever knowing
Earth has no sorrow but heaven can remove.
