In preparation to rereading “A Grief Observed” by C.S. Lewis I found I had underlined some passages that are still too good not to share:
“This is one of the things I’m afraid of. The agonies, the mad midnight moments, must, in the course of nature, die away. But what will follow?”
When did I quit crying myself to sleep at night? When did I begin to accept that he was not returning…that he could NOT return to me….that this was REALITY? Those ‘mad midnight moments’ did die away….and what followed was an acceptance of sorts.
“I had been warned-I had warned myself-not to reckon on wordly hapiness. We were even promised sufferings. They were part of the programme. We were even told, ‘Blessed are they that mourn,’ and I accepted it. I’ve got nothing that I hadn’t bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not in imagination.”
“You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.”
“Aren’t all these notes the senseless writhings of a man who won’t accept the fact that there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it?” I was so glad I read this as it gave me freedom to live my grief. I have not hid from it, but have tried to experience every moment of it….because I believe the only true way to acceptance is to have not denied it. I hope that makes sense.
