The Pain of Loss
The pain of loss. It really is the worst kind of pain I have to deal with. Especially when it comes out of nowhere, and makes no sense to my tiny human mind that invests so much time and energy in whatever comes my way – only to have it snatched from my life, all of a sudden, without warning, every single time.
I’ve learned to take my time to process the emotions, the flare-ups, the grief, and everything that comes along with it. Yet what I still always find myself stuck at is: my need for closure. My need for answers. For an explanation that can set my heart at rest, once and for all.
So I’m able to do a little better on accepting my losses – accepting there’s so much hidden kheir behind each of them that I might never get to know of. Yet that still doesn’t stop my mind from wondering; was it something I did, so maybe I’d work on it for the future? Was it something about them, so I can maybe give myself a break and stop replaying those scenes I wish I can undo, over and over? Was it something else entirely, so I can mend the pieces of my wounded ego that regrets having let go of all it’s been keeping so shielded?
The questions flow, yet the answers never follow. And I feel stuck, waiting for some external force to offer the closure my life depends on. Only that I’ve realized my real closures never come after getting answers.
Sometimes there really is no answer. Those losses can happen for no logical reason.
My sense of closure though, almost always come from within – every time I’m able to let go of the fear that I might never get to re-experience that which I’ve lost. Or let go of the thought that I’ve already poured so much of myself into it to consider starting over. Every time my mind is able to open up to the possibilities, after a long period of not being able to look beyond what’s missing, I realize that my need for answers no longer prevails.
In a way, it is believing in عوض ربنا. But not in the sense of waiting for something to make up for what’s been hurting. It’s more of, internalizing that I deserve to end up at a much better place, and that what I’ve lost was only really part of the plan to get me moving towards it. And so it’s not that I shouldn’t have invested so much in it, for it was meant to take me to new sides of myself anyway. But being so fixated on what I can no longer have, might in fact lead me to miss out on where I’d rather be. Which sounds like a much greater loss, in all honesty.
It’s easier said than done, yet being able to think of this is helping me let go of my obsession with answers. The answers might never come, but I deserve to move forward. Actually, the answers might exist inside me, while I’m so focused on having the universe bring them over to me. The answers won’t necessarily bring me closer to a closure. Otherwise He would’ve made sure I know about them – if that’s what He thought I needed.
